BloodSport: Domm's Journey
by avatarjk137
Summary: My entry into the dA contest, Blood-Sport. The story of my character Domm as he is blackmailed by the Empire into a gladiatorial tournament with some of the Empire's best and worst. OC centric, no CC except perhaps the Tallest, rated T for violence.
1. The BloodSport Begins

**I do not own _Invader Zim,_ Jhonen Vasquez and the less awesome Nickelodeon do. I do, however, own most of the characters mentioned here. Sideos owns Sideos, Ravenpuff owns Tika, Half-Dude owns Ukengrazer, and LordSlappy owns STAIN. The latter two aren't here, they're on deviantART.**

**If you're wondering what this is, it's an entry into a contest called Blood-Sport over on deviantART. You just need a full-blooded Irken OC to enter. You can compete with either comics or stories, although it's slightly handicapped towards comics because they take longer. It'll be all kinds of fun violence and fighting. If you have a dA account and an Irken OC, I encourage your entry, but you need to enter by Saturday.**

**A Good Sport**

**Prologue**

Domm brought up his battle saw, directly into the chin of the Vortian advancing on him. The many tiny teeth of the chainsaw spun and spun, and Domm met almost no resistance as his blade split open the face of the poor thing. He turned away from the thing immediately after, letting the blood spray onto his back and shoulder. Turning away brought a new threat into his line of sight – a tall, blue-eyed Irken bringing down a beam saber. He blocked with the chainsaw, but his opponent's blade could not be cut through or disrupted, and the beam was beginning to overheat his sawblade.

"Domm," a faint, far-off voice called out.

Frustrated, Domm kicked out with his leg and knocked one foot out from under the other Irken, knocking him off-balance. He shoved forward as hard as he could, and the swordsman fell flat on his back, the saber skidding away. Before he could recover, Domm plunged the blade down into his foe's chest. Unlike an Earth chainsaw, a Grimm Special battle saw gave off a soft hum instead of a motor's roar, although the sound of cutting through something hard was the same. The shriek of bone being sawed through and the hum of the saw itself were music to Domm's mismatched antennae as the tension (and the life) left the Irken's blue eyes.

"Domm!" Still far away, but more insistent this time.

"Abort," Domm said calmly, and the Irken, the chainsaw, the blood, and the warehouse they had been fighting in all faded away. Domm took off the simulator helmet, and looked around. His team's gym consisted of the virtual reality simulator, a treadmill and other cardio machines, several weight machines, a small shooting range, and a punching bag printed with the words "FIST GOES HERE". Standing at the door were the rest of his team: a pale, green-eyed female Irken wearing what was once an Invader's uniform, a tall, four-armed blue alien with an alarming smile and light armor, and a large, imposing Planet Jacker with dark green skin and a lot of navy-and-black armor. "What's going on? Are we going to fight some wanted idiots in a bar again?"

"Nah, we've got some kind of urgent probe message," Erris said, and Lio stepped aside to let a floating metal ball with a built-in screen bob into the room.

"Crap. Does this involve me?"

"I dunno. It's urgent, and it's from the _Empire_, so I figured you should be there to watch it."

Domm shrugged and pressed the only button on the thing, causing the screen to flicker on. It showed a live feed of an Irken with a visor and a winning smile, his antennae slicked back. "Ah, _Dommination Industries._ I'm glad to see you've responded. You have been cordially invited to Blood-Sport."

"And what exactly is Blood-Sport?" Domm was almost expressionless. Initial dealings with customers usually meant a very professional tone with Domm doing most of the talking, and Domm had decided to treat this invitation the same way. The others easily fell in line with this plan, silently standing at attention and staring at the screen as Domm negotiated (although Edh, who had trouble staying still for long, twitched his fingers like mad).

"It's a competition among the best of the best Irkens, young and old, rich and poor, loyal or independent. You are dropped on a conquered planet with no external weapons, and you fight other Irkens, with the last one standing being crowned the Empire's Champion."

"What happens if I lose?"

"The Irken Empire cannot give a one-hundred-percent guarantee of your safety, but we assure you-"

"Okay, I probably die. What happens if I win? What exactly does the Champion do?"

"There are no official duties of the Empire's Champion. The Blood-Sport is televised, so you will win glory throughout the Empire."

"Fame and glory, no work at my new job, cool. You said 'Independent' Irkens will be fighting… you mean the scum of the Empire, the rebels and troublemakers, don't you?"

"Well… er… ah… um…" the Irken spokesman shuffled his papers, looking for the proper scripted answer.

"Just yes or no, please."

"…yes."

"Can I collect the bounties on anybody I kill in the contest?"

"I don't see why not."

"Excellent. Last question…" Domm flashed a winning smile of his own. "What happens if I refuse?"

"Well…" the spokesman's grin took on a vicious look. "I have an outstanding execution order for two Defectives that's over one hundred years old right here…"

"We're in. All four of us will be wherever you need us to be by week's end."

"Appreciated, but the contest is for Irkens only, and no alliances are permitted. One of you two may go to represent your company…"

"I will-" Erris began to say, but Domm cut her off.

"I'll represent Dommination Industries."

"_Excellent!_ The Empire looks forward to seeing you there. I'll transmit coordinates now…"

* * *

"Why'd it have to be YOU?!" Erris yelled at Domm as they neared the destination planet. "Why'd you _cut me off?!_ You know I want to do this fight more than you!" Lio looked up from the issue of _Sociopath Quarterly_ he was reading (this issue: 101 tips for avoiding conversation!), and Edh glanced back from his place at the pilot's seat. Domm, however, looked Erris evenly in the eye (not hard, considering they were the same height).

"Why am I going? Well… one, you'd get killed. Two, you specialize in marksmanship, and they don't allow us to begin with weapons other than what's built into our PAKs. Three, you have no spider-legs and no weapons in your PAK, and while a flight-enabled tackle is powerful, it's rarely lethal against an Irken. Four, you need to connect to a power outlet every few days for a viral purge, or you get sick… and die. Five, and most importantly, **you'd get killed!**"

"Then ignore them! We'll deal with anybody they send after us!"

"It'll be bad for business. Conversely, the publicity this will generate if I win will be good for business."

"Screw the rules then, and send Lio down in your place. He enjoys killing more than either of us, and he's practically impossible to hit. He'll kill everybody down there!"

"I really will," Lio said in agreement.

"If we sent in a non-Irken and he won on all Irken television, it would be a disaster. I have to enter, and I have to win," Domm said surely. "Erris, look, I know you'd rather die than live in fear of death, but you have to consider that the team needs your strategy."

"More than the team needs your leadership?" Erris asked sourly, one antenna raised.

"I actually have a fighting chance," Domm said. "Look, I'll keep in touch, okay? I'll keep my long-range communicator on, and you guys can feed me continuous advice. It'll be a good old-fashioned coalition victory."

"Fine," Erris spat. "Look, just be careful, all right? This is just the kind of fighting you don't prefer. You like orchestrated, every-move-planned-out-in-my-head-beforehand hunt-downs that make us look like battle gods, or barroom brawls where you have ten times the fighting ability of any of your opponents. This is a gritty, hand-to-hand, protracted melee with other prizefighters, psychopaths, mercs, and general elite soldiers. Some of the Empire's most infamous names will be there."

"What, will _Sideos_ be there?" Domm asked jokingly.

"No, but Tika will. Ukengrazer's son and prodigy will. There's a rumor circulating that STAIN will be there."

"STAIN and Tika? No kidding?" Domm whistled. "Those two bounties alone would keep the roof over our head for a hundred years. And is Ukengrazer that one drill-sergeant type?"

"Yes."

"Ohhhh…" Domm said, and then, with a different inflection, "Oh. Well, I doubt the rest of them will be bringing in a support team. Who else?"

"The usual mass murderers, loose cannon invaders… some people who aren't fighters at all."

"Cool… alright, Erris, I'm going to rely on you for strategic info. Lio, I'll call you up if I need mechanical help. Edh… what will I call you for, Edh?"

"Flavor, big boy, flavor! I'm so damn sexy, your head will explode! The mere sound of my voice will K.O. your opponents in a rush of orgasmic ecstacy!" Edh cackled and pulled the craft into a barrel roll for no specific reason.

"That's right," Domm said in a I'm-too-weary-to-disagree tone of voice. "I'm going to get psyched," he said, reclining his seat until he was horizontal. "Alert me upon arrival."

**End of Chapter**

**So that's it then. Every chapter from here on will be a fight scene until I'm eliminated from the tournament, or I've won. I hope it's the second one. If you like bloody fights between Irken OCs, I encourage you to keep reading or join yourself (or both!). If you want to read more about Domm, check out his introductory fic, _Dommination Industries. _Ciao!**


	2. Round 1: vs Vex

**Well, the battle has begun. I'm facing Mech-Maker in Round 1, which won't be easy. Good luck… and no mercy. **

**I do not own Invader Zim, Irkens, or Vex. Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon own Invader Zim and Irkens, and Mech-Maker owns Vex. I do own Domm and crew.**

**Battle 1**

**Vs. Vex: Hunters**

A silent figure strode confidently down a wide lane between high stacks of steel crates, each about a yard across and cubic. The Irken was tall, taller than Domm, and heavily armed. He carried a pistol, had a rifle slung over his back and a bandolier of grenades in the front, and carried a combat knife in his boot. He wore black and silver, form-fitting armor with glowing blue markings that left his fingers exposed. He also wore a scowl; his green eyes were heavily lidded, and his antennae (which were curiously missing their tips) hung back behind his head.

He was lit up in the light of the setting sun, but Domm was in the shadows. Domm took a bite of his brownie and squinted angrily; to his eyes, the world's small, blue sun was too bright even through his opaque black goggles. He wouldn't confront the taller, armed-to-the-tooth Irken; not yet. He brought up one of his spider legs, which slid open at the tip, revealing a small black lens. The lens watched Domm's quarry for a few minutes, capturing him from several angles on a short video feed. A low feminine voice quietly crackled from a clip on Domm's left antennae. _"Good work, Domm, that's plenty. Head back to your hideout and I'll brief you."_ Taking another large bite of brownie, Domm turned around and crept off, not noticing his foe tilt his head back and sniff the air.

"Chocolate?" he muttered to himself.

--

A quarter mile from Domm's earlier location, he made his hideout. It was in a maze of huge shipping crates (the variety found in barges), stacked three deep. Three rows down from a column of crates with the letters **'S-I-N'** marked vertically down their doors, there was a row of crates where only the bottom's door was open. Domm had hollowed out the bottoms of the top two to create makeshift trapdoors, and was using the middle and uppermost levels as a base of operations. There he stored extra batteries for his weapons, a first aid kit, and a package of various pastry delights to keep his spirits up.

_"How are those brownies I packed you, Big Boy?"_ The shrill voice that spoke could have caused weak men to drive stakes into their ears… and that's without accounting for the flirtatious tone it carried.

"They're delicious, Edh, thank you." Domm spoke into the side of another of his spider legs, which held his communicator's mouthpiece. "Erris, do you have the intel on that target yet?"

It was the feminine voice again, Erris. _"His name is Vex. Best I can tell, he's a bounty hunter like us, part of an official Order of Hunters that's part of the Empire. They've fallen into disuse recently."_

"We've competed for kills with the Order of Hunters before," Domm replied. "They've fallen into disuse because they're no great shakes."

_"Well, he's supposed to be a little better than the rest. He shares a lot of similarities with you. He's more of a firearms specialist, so I'd suggest closing and using the Grimm, especially since he's got some fancy battle armor on that shields him."_

"How do I get through the armor?"

"_The old-fashioned way – you hit him over and over until his shields fail. He's got a temper, so maybe if you get him good and angry, he'll let go of his hunter's training."_

"So I'm fighting another hunter. I'm best off if I close in and fight with the Grimm – which I don't like – and he's one of the best, and he most likely hates me, right?"

_"Most of those who work directly for the Empire are conditioned to hate Defectives, so yeah,"_ Lio's deep baritone confirmed.

"Sing, hallelujah, sing," Domm sighed. Suddenly loud reports broke the relative silence as bullet after bullet pierced the side of the shipping crate, leaving cones of light pouring into the darkness. Domm dove to the ground, but a piece of shrapnel blown off the crate wall cut into his cheek. Luckily, the other bullets missed. _He tracked me down already?_ Domm thought. _He must be good. How did he…_

"If you're wondering," a drawling voice called out, "and if you're still alive, I followed the trail of crumbs." Domm mentally cursed himself out for leaving brownie crumbs behind. He couldn't afford to make mistakes like that – this tournament already called for him to forsake all his usual advantages (backup, ample time to plan, and half the element of surprise). He counted the bullet holes – the gun that Vex fired had a 25-round clip, so it was probably his rifle. His antennae twitched as he heard Vex reload his gun and extend his spider-legs, and he stayed as silent as possible while drawing and priming his Enigma.

Domm stood and faced the barred-from-the-outside door of the crate he was in. He guessed that Vex would elevate himself with his spider legs and force the door open with his gun at the ready, checking to see if Domm was still alive and conscious. A shining blue orb of energy had formed within the Enigma's three crooked claws, and Domm leveled it at the door.

His guess was dead-on. Vex pulled the doors open with his upper two spider legs, and the instant he was visible, Domm fired. The Enigma 'fired' by disrupting the core of the energy ball held in its claws, creating a narrow spray of plasma energy that spread out a bit with distance. The principle was different, but the basic effect was a plasma variant of a shotgun. Vex's reflexes were quick, and he evaded to the side, but one bit of 'buckshot' struck his arm, and it was absorbed into the shield. Since Vex was balanced mostly on his rear spider legs, the quick side movement threw him off, and Domm took the opportunity to leap out of the dead-end crate and into open air, firing at Vex as he fell.

Vex fell too, retracting his spider legs into his PAK to dodge the shot, and landed on his feet. Domm rolled to his feet as well, and they both aimed at each other simultaneously. "You must be Vex," Domm said. "It's good to meet you." In his mind, the small talk was only a stall tactic while he figured out how to beat Vex. _He's just like me… a professional hunter. He thinks like me. We'll probably always anticipate each other's actions… therefore, I have to try some really stupid tactics to catch him off-guard. _He continued the conversation while he tried to think of some fantastically futile and stupid gestures.

"And you're that independent bounty hunter… Domm, right? I'm surprised you've heard of me," Vex said with a false smile.

"I do my homework."

"An independent hunter of your talents… I'm surprised you weren't inducted into our order some time ago. You wouldn't happen to be… Defective, would you?" He paused, and sneered. Evidentially, Domm's expression had been enough to confirm it. "What's under those goggles?"

"Oh, just a pair of eyes… are you sure _you_ aren't defective? I mean, those antennae are a little strange-looking."

Any trace of pleasantry in Vex instantly disappeared. "Don't mock my antennae!" he snarled.

"Then don't speak of my eyes!" By now, Domm had thought up one or two delightfully reckless tactics, and he decided to try out the first one. _Get him to lose his temper… check,_ Domm thought to himself as he charged forward. Vex opened fire, but Domm sidestepped and kept rushing, raising his shotgun and firing as he did so. Vex jumped away from the shotgun blast, and Domm now homed in on his new location, firing again. Between his surprise that Domm was reckless enough to charge straight towards a trained Irken with an assault rifle and the suppressive fire of the Enigma, Vex couldn't get a proper shot in on Domm before it was too late.

Domm slid to a stop right in front of Vex and delivered a shot point-blank into his stomach (chest height for Domm). Although Vex's armor absorbed the damage, the impact still knocked Vex off his feet, and the lights on his armor shifted from blue to green as the shields began to lose power. Pressing his advantage, Domm leapt into the air over Vex's prone form and fired again. Vex frantically rolled away from the spray of plasma, and Domm had flipped in the air and landed on his feet by the time Vex had leapt to his.

_I can't let up now! _Domm charged towards Vex again, this time not even bothering to fire. Vex aimed his gun at Domm and squeezed the trigger… and Domm grabbed each end of his gun in one claw and slammed the middle up under the barrel of Vex's rifle, causing him to fire a short burst of rounds into the air. Vex snarled, twisted his gun up and around, and tried to fire again. Domm twisted his Enigma vertically, and locked it again.

This went on for several more such 'locks'. Vex would try to twist his rifle around so that he could hit Domm (and usually he'd squeeze off a couple of rounds, in hope Domm wouldn't be fast enough), and Domm would parry the gun with his own. Because of the awkward way he was holding his Enigma, he couldn't fire back. This idea was rapidly becoming less and less foolishly brilliant in his eyes, and more simply foolish. After a couple of moments, Vex brought his spider legs out, hoping to throw Domm off-balance. Domm had anticipated this, and slammed his own extending spider legs into Vex's, forcing him to stumble back. Domm flipped his gun around, but even thrown back, Vex was too fast a draw.

"Say goodnight!" Vex yelled triumphantly as his finger hit the trigger. _CLICK._ "What?" Vex frantically pulled the trigger again. _CLICKCLICKCLICK._

"Out of ammo," Domm said with a grin that thanked the stars for his luck. He fired a blast at Vex, again from within a yard of him, and blasted Vex back. This time Vex caught himself with his spider legs, and took off to the side, even as his armor's lights changed from green to red. Vex pulled his pistol and fired a few retreating shots at Domm, causing him to dive for cover and allowing Vex to make his escape back towards the land of boxes where Domm had first located him. Domm got to his feet and chased after Vex, squeezing off a few wild shotgun blasts. _I love it when they run,_ Domm thought, satisfied with himself. _I can almost taste it._ He extended his own spider legs and set them skittering forward as fast as he could manage, gaining on Vex.

Vex saw Domm come up behind him, lowered his head between his spider legs, and fired rounds from his pistol toward Domm in the upside-down cradle position. Domm weaved from side to side, and he was moving so fast the bullets weren't likely to find their mark. Grimacing, Vex reloaded the clip in his pistol, and then commanded his legs to leap high into the air and slightly to the side before retracting. In the air, he pivoted and took another couple of shots at Domm, who fired back. Both were unable to aim properly like this, and missed. Vex landed on top of a long, ordered lane of shipping crates and began to run along those, firing his pistol at Domm again. Domm fired back, but their elevation differences were too great, so Domm maneuvered his spider legs to run laterally along the opposite row of crates as they shot at each other.

And so began a short but intense chase. Vex was a better shot than Domm, but they were both running to the side, and concentrating more on dodging each other's fire than launching a real counterattack. "You know, there's a major difference between us," Vex shouted, fighting to keep the breathlessness out of his voice as he sprinted and reloaded.

"And what's that?" Domm asked, releasing another spray of plasma that Vex had to jump over.

"You can hunt whomever you like, as long as they have a bounty on their head. And when that gets old, you can sell your skills to the highest bidder, to defend them, escort some goods, or track down the man who killed their father – whatever! But I… I only have one kind of mission." He took three more shots at Domm, causing Domm to fully clamber up to the top of the row across from him. "All I do is track down and either capture or kill Irken Defectives… just… like… YOU!" Punctuating his statement, he fired a bullet from his pistol that struck the tip of one of Domm's spider legs. Thrown completely off balance at maximum speed, Domm tumbled off the crates into a large pile of haphazardly stacked metal boxes, which collapsed on top of him like a sandcastle falls into its moat after a large wave. "Got you."

Groaning, Domm climbed from the boxes, but immediately dropped back down when Vex fired a shot at him. Domm slammed each spider leg into a different empty box, piercing their sides, and rolled off the pile. Vex fired off a few more rounds, but Domm slammed the boxes on his lower two legs into the ground and stacked the other two on top, creating a portable shield. Sure, it was extremely heavy and straining on his back, especially when he tried to move the lower two boxes instead of using them as support, but Vex couldn't properly shoot through it. Domm waited until Vex was finished shooting at the boxes, and pulled the top crates apart, giving him a narrow channel to see (and shoot) through. Vex was reloading both his pistol and rifle, and was surprised to see Domm. "Peek-a-boo!" Domm fired a shotgun blast at Vex's legs, knocking them out from under him.

Even as his chin hit the ground, Vex opened fire on Domm, so Domm quickly closed the channel, crouching safely behind his crates. Vex quickly jumped to his feet again and began to circle around Domm. "You _will_ fall today, Defective!" Domm realized that four box-shields were too clumsy, and promptly flung the two on his right toward Vex in rapid succession. Vex dodged the tumbling steel cubes and fired both his guns, but Domm brought his remaining two boxes around and hid behind them (with only two, he was significantly more mobile). He opened a gap between them, filled the gap with his Enigma, and fired. Vex dodged and circled around again, and Domm pivoted again, keeping the crates between them as he kept firing.

"Oh, damn this!" Vex made a spider-leg assisted jump back onto a row of large crates, holstering his pistol and reloading his rifle in midair. He landed on his own feet (retracting the legs again), and began sloppily laying down suppressive fire on Domm by firing his rifle one-handed. With his left hand, he grabbed a plasma grenade from his bandolier, armed it, and threw it in a soft underhand arc. Domm's eyes widened behind his goggles when he realized the tops of the empty boxes were open… and Vex had just thrown a grenade cleanly into the upper crate. He heaved the thing at Vex as hard as he could, then pulled up his Enigma and began blasting wildly in that general direction.

Vex dove up and off the crates as he saw the doomed box come spinning at him, and the box exploded as it passed under him. Vex managed to ride the shockwave high into the air, and began firing his rifle down at Domm. He also extended his spider legs to cushion the forty-foot drop. Domm saw Vex shooting down on him, and instinctively flung the last box at him in response. The box caught Vex in the shoulder as he fell, sending the rifle flying and changing his trajectory. In the end, Vex came down right on top of Domm, their faces inches from each other. Vex frantically drew his pistol, but Domm already had the Enigma pointed at him. "Guten nacht," Domm said softly as he blasted Vex up and off.

The red lights on Vex's armor flickered out completely, and Vex gritted his teeth as his body was burned by dozens of tiny short-circuits. Domm grinned, pleased with himself… until Vex drew his pistol and shot him in the left arm twice. Instantly, Domm tasted metal, smelled blood, saw double, and heard a roaring sound. The Defective mercenary cried out, dropped his Enigma, and leapt behind a pile of discarded crates. "What's wrong, Defective?" Vex yelled out, regaining his breath and fingering his pistol nervously. "You run at the first bit of pain?"

"I don't run," Domm responded from over the small mountain of crates. "I make tactical retreats." Following the sound of his voice, Vex threw another grenade, which Domm fled from as he inspected his wounds. His left arm had a bullet lodged in the shoulder, and another four inches below. He could patch it up in a few hours, but for now the arm was useless. _Guess I'll have to use the Grimm Special after all._

A small slot at the top of his modified PAK opened up, and the Grimm Special launched a few feet into the air. It had a hilt, pommel and simple guard, like a rapier or longsword, although there was a trigger on the hilt with two levels of speed. Above that was a thin rod covered in razor-sharp teeth that could make thousands of rotations per minute. The back of the saw had a casing over much of its length, so only the tip and front were suitable for cutting. Domm easily caught the hilt one-handed as it fell, took a few practiced warm-up swings, and clicked the trigger, relishing and at the same time a bit fearful of the hum it produced. Before, he had been in pain. Now, though, his PAK was pumping painkillers into him and the chainsaw was humming. Now Domm saw red, smelled fear, heard only that magical hum, and could practically taste victory.

Over the wall, Vex's unique antennae twitched in worry as he heard the sound, too. "What kind of weapon is _that_?"

"It's my kind of weapon," Domm called, "and it really puts the blood in Blood-Sport!" He climbed halfway up the box pile, pushed the top few down in Vex's general direction, waited a split second, and leapt over.

"What the hell?" Vex aimed up to shoot at Domm, but a box slammed into his gut, throwing his aim off. Domm screamed and dropped down on Vex, who jumped away from the downward slice and sidestepped the subsequent low forward rush. Domm kicked Vex to the side, gathered himself up, and leapt after him with a fresh, maniacal fervor. Vex jumped back from Domm's flurry of swings and tried to fire, but discovered it was too hazardous to extend his arm properly. He lashed out with a spider leg and impaled a box, mimicking Domm's earlier move, and as he jumped away again, he flung the metal cube forward. With a twist of the wrist and a quick upward slice, Domm bisected the box and charged through the new gap he made. The speed he cut through with allowed him to catch the tip of Vex's pistol just as he was about to fire, ruining the front end of the pistol. Vex yelled and threw the now-useless weapon at Domm's face (he missed), pulling his knife as he jumped away yet again.

"Now who's running, Vex?" Domm snarled, but even now he was considering, as he swung menacingly at Vex and intimidated the larger Irken. Better blade or not, Vex still had two hands usable, and one well-timed grab of Domm's forearm could result in severe shanking. If Vex got enough breathing room, he could also use one of his remaining two grenades, or worse, grab the rifle he had dropped forty feet away. Domm decided his best option was to just charge in, and watch Vex's hands and feet closely. "Let me show you how not to fuck around!" He dashed forward, saw held behind him.

"You mean we were fucking around before?" Vex hopped the waist-height horizontal swing Domm opened with, and stabbed his knife toward Domm's forehead from midair. Domm fell onto his back and lashed out with both feet. Vex was only able to clumsily parry with his off-hand, and he still stumbled back, allowing Domm to flip back onto his feet, spin around, and swing the Grimm at Vex's neck height. Vex ducked his time, but Domm was just waiting to drive his knee into Vex's chin, sending him sprawling back. Domm brought his saw down, and Vex was forced to stab his knife forward in a parry. There was a sound almost like a scream as Vex's knife's blade and handle were split in a cloud of sparks.

Vex yelped and dropped the dagger as he jumped away, settling into a general sort of fighting stance. With one hand, he beckoned Domm forward, and made a valiant attempt at a confident grin. "You did not just do that!" Domm snarled, charging forward. He slashed downward, expecting the sidestep that Vex made and spinning quickly into a beheading slice. Vex faced away from Domm and ducked the high horizontal, and Domm spun on his heels again, intending to follow with a low horizontal slash. Vex interrupted him by letting his momentum slam his hands to the floor and hopping up with his legs, mule-kicking Domm in the wounded arm as he spun. Domm cried out and staggered back. "I'll throw your head at my next opponent!" Domm threatened.

"If you wanted a piece of me, Defective, why didn't you just ask?" Vex deadpanned. Domm growled and charged forward, thrusting his chainsaw straight at Vex's abdomen. Vex sidestepped and swung a backhand at Domm's face, but Domm leaned back and out of range as he reversed the saw's blade and swung upward. Vex leaned back just enough to avoid losing his chin and drove his other fist into Domm's chest, striking the Irken equivalent of a sternum and just missing the solar plexus. Domm gritted his teeth, reversed the Grimm's blade again, and brought it down toward Vex, but surprisingly, the tall Hunter blocked with his arm. The blade quickly cut through the armor, but Vex grabbed Domm's forearm with his free hand and pushed the saw up and away before it could cut far into his actual arm.

"Damn!" Domm knew he was caught, and he sprung his spider legs to try and escape, but Vex's own came out and blocked his. Domm tried to pull away, but with his one good arm held out of play, Vex had a major advantage. And he exploited it. Vex slammed his fist back and forth across Domm's face a few times, drawing some blood. If Domm had teeth in the human sense rather than the fused Irken zipper-teeth, they would have fallen out. Once Domm seemed good and dazed, Vex grabbed his foe's goggles.

"Let's have a look at those eyes, shall we, Defective?"

Domm spat more blood from his mouth and burned through the red haze in his mind. "My _name _is Domm." In a flash, two more spider legs popped from his PAK, these tipped in wicked scythes. One slammed into and through Vex's free hand, yanking it away from Domm's eyes. The other plunged between the green-eyed hunter's ribs and into his chest before lodging most of the way through his spine. "And I think it's time I fulfilled those promises to kill you." He felt Vex go limp and jumped away, watching him fall face-down to the ground.

"You… bastard…" Vex gasped, raising himself up shakily on his elbows. His spine had been severed, and his legs were completely useless. He was also having trouble activating his spider-legs, which were spasming on the ground around him but didn't look like they'd support him any time soon. Domm calmly walked the thirty feet to his Enigma, sliding his saw back into his PAK. He grabbed the shotgun with his working hand and walked calmly back toward Vex. "If you're going to kill me, just do it! I've already let down the Empire!"

Domm laughed. "You've only let down yourself. The Empire's glad to see you go, if you're the type who'd be invited to Blood-Sport."

"I asked to come," Vex admitted, his antennae lower even than usual.

"Then I suppose you're just an idiot with a little too much self-confidence." Domm crouched down in front of Vex, looking over the sparking armor, and the grievous wounds to his chest and arm. "Tell me, Vex, do you have a bounty on your head?"

"Of course not!"

"Great…" Domm said sarcastically. "No money for me, then. Would you like me to spare you?"

Vex gave a harsh, bitter laugh. "I came to this tournament fully expecting to win or die trying. I would never return home a loser, licking my wounds."

"Then why are you still here?"

"…What?" The question caught Vex off-guard.

"You have no chance of victory now, and you know it. Yet even now you fight to get your spider legs working again. Even now, you try to crawl towards me, with no life in your legs and blood pouring from your arm. You continue to grasp at your fleeing consciousness. Why haven't you let the darkness surround you yet?"

Vex looked Domm square in his unreadable eyes. "It's the Irken way."

Domm smiled. "That's good… now I can kill you." He fired a blast into Vex's Pak, fragmenting it. Vex's spider legs went limp. He resisted the urge to scream with every fiber of his body and grabbed Domm's ankle with his good arm. "You were a great fight. I wanted your last words to be something noble, at least. You deserved that much." He adjusted the aim of the shotgun to Vex's face. "Smile for the history books," Domm said as he squeezed the trigger.

**End of Round 1**

**Vex really is closer to Domm than any other OC in the tournament. However, with Vex's conditioned hatred of Defectives, I thought Domm would be the one who's more accepting of this. There are some OCs I'd have a hard time killing, but at least Vex would prefer it this way. I hope I did Vex justice; I think I handled it well, but that's really up to Mech-Maker.**

**I apologize for the cheesy dialogue and sheer volume of this fight scene. That's just the way I write.**


	3. Intermission

**This was a spectator entry I did for Blood-Sport. An unofficial, between-rounds chapter that develops my little subplot and eases the transition between rounds 1 and 2. Enjoy.**

**I do not own the Invader Zim universe, Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon do. I do not own Blood-Sport. I do own Domm, Lio, Erris, and Edh.**

**Blood-Sport **

**Interlude: Serious Mode**

Erris groaned, clutching her antennae in pain. Edh was driving wildly through the upper atmosphere of a planet, swerving as he sang along with an obnoxious twenty-year-old novelty song being played on the radio. She turned to Lio, who was calmly reading his magazine. She called his name a few times, but got no response over the screech of Edh's voice. Finally, she tapped him on the shoulder, and got his attention. "How do you stand the singing?!" she called.

Lio grinned and undid some of the armor around his head, revealing a spongy cork-like item in his ear cavity. "I bet you wish Irkens had ears to plug," he chuckled as he clipped his helmet back into place. Erris sighed and rubbed the sides of her head.

Finally, she could take it no longer. "EDH! Would you give it a _rest_ already? I mean, DAAAMMNN!"

"Can do, babe – we're here anyway." Edh shut off the radio and cut the engines, causing the ship to drift loosely across the sky. "Attention, passengers, this is your sexy sex pilot speaking. We're now in sexy high orbit over the very sexy planet that Blood-Sport is being sexily held on. That is all… about sex." He pulled a portable game system out of a glove compartment and began playing it, his tongue sticking out at an odd angle.

"Do you think Domm will be mad that we're staying so close to the planet? I mean, this can't be legal." Lio had taken the earplugs out, although he was still reading his _SQ_ mag.

"He probably will and this probably isn't," Erris sighed, "but I really couldn't care less about either of those things. This is about making sure Domm doesn't die."

"Yeah, and besides," Edh said as he racked up a high score, "there are like forty ships up here! Maybe some of these are Armada, but I'm guessing a bunch are just here to root for their friends and make sure they don't bite the dust!" A blank look slowly suffused his face, causing his jaw to go a bit slack, and then he cleared his throat and turned to Erris. "So, you're a girl, huh?"

Erris sighed, resisting the urge to pistol-whip her longtime friend. "You can go back to **singing** now, Edh."

--

Domm sighed and bandaged the bullet wounds. He had carefully removed the slugs (they were unaffected by the magnets in his spider legs, so he had used his other hand), and applied an antibiotic salve. Between the salve and the natural healing factor the PAKs granted their users, Domm's arm was already usable again, and by night's end, the wound would be healed with little to no scarring.

The thought of 'night's end' caused him to peek out of his little hidey-hole through the bullet holes Vex had punched into the side of it. Moonlight from several small moons was shining through; the sun had gone down a few hours ago. Best he could tell, this planet had a twenty-nine-hour day, and there wasn't much tilt to the axis, so he judged he had another eleven hours until sunrise (give or take). This location wouldn't do as a base any longer. It would be too easily seen now, especially since the door no longer closed properly since Vex had wrenched it open. What Domm really needed was a new location, and possibly to set this place up as a trap.

Luckily, he had an opportunity to leave: Domm had found a small construction vehicle in one of these crates on the way back from the fight with Vex. It was a vehicle with magnets, cutting lasers and claws all over, meant for several light construction tasks. It could probably go pretty fast across land as well, although Domm guessed it was quite noisy. He had sent pictures of the chassis and engine back to his base, and Lio assured Domm it would be ready within two hours of tinkering that he could guide Domm through.

Thanks to the practicality of raiding corpses, Domm had a trap ready as well. A search of Vex's body had yielded a pair of fully functional plasma grenades and several clips of ammo compatible with the rifle that was lying nearby, undamaged except for some scratches. He put the rifle in the construction vehicle for safekeeping, but decided the grenades would be perfect for the trap, along with some bait. Domm mentally patted himself on the back as he enjoyed a croissant that Edh had packed for him.

_I wonder if this is really being televised,_ he asked himself calmly. _I haven't seen any cameras at all… if I had to kill that Vex guy, it had better have entertained a lot of people._ As if on cue, a small, floating metal droid featuring several camera lenses floated up through the hole in the floor and stared unblinkingly at Domm. "So much for that," he mumbled rudely. "Can I help you?"

_"Is that any way to greet the host of Blood-Sport, Contestant Domm?"_ It was that oily man who had first coerced Domm into joining in his own base.

"Actually, yes. Yes, it is the proper way to greet somebody who forced you into a contest where all the losers die. Sharply and without etiquette."

_"Awwww… c'mon, Domm… you know you're enjoying it…"_

Domm thought back. The chainsaw… the chase… even getting shot in the arm… yes, he was loving it, as much as he hated to admit it. "Who's my next opponent?"

_"We don't CHOOSE your opponent, Domm… you go out and find them… or they come and find you… we can arrange for them to discover your location, if you hide for too long."_

"I think I'll go take a look around." Domm leapt through the hole, and walked out of the lower crate into fresh air. With a single spider leg-assisted leap, he was on top of his hideout, and looking around. He heard nothing, at first. As the silence grew heavier, his hearing grew more attuned, and soon he could hear noises in the far distance. Gunshots, mostly, and a scream. Suddenly, a deep sound passed him by, so low in pitch he felt rather than heard it. An explosion, a large but distant one. He turned, and saw… something. Grumbling, he tapped the top of his goggles, using their artificial zoom function. Zeroing in on the source of the noise, he saw a huge, semicircular shockwave, over five miles distant. The thin atmosphere allowed the noise to carry this far. From where he stood, he couldn't see any Irkens even at maximum zoom, but he would bet that two were battling… and one was just in for an unpleasant surprise.

He turned, gritting his teeth against the vertigo rush brought by turning while looking through a zoom lens. There, in the distance, was the jungle. It lay across a river, and next to the river were warehouses. Wait… what was that? He happened to catch a small silhouette in the distance, walking out of a warehouse. No, not walking. Crawling, reeling, stumbling. A wounded victor? Domm was wrong again as the figure left the shadows. This Irken was far as well, but close enough to make out a ragged purple shirt… long antennae… violet eyes… it was Tika, he was sure of it.

_"Tika of the Royal Five…" _Domm whispered. "Payday times ten thousand." But could he take her in close combat? He didn't think so, and she was between two and three miles away – too far to safely lure her to his trap. The lure began at Vex's corpse, a quarter mile from where he stood. If she crossed the line between Vex's body and Domm at any point, she would come right to Domm. All he could do until then was hope… and hide himself again.

_"Can I get a quote for the recap on your opinion about your first fight?"_ The drone persisted.

"Yeah… regular Irkens just don't cut it. Bring me a Defective for Round 2."

**End of Chapter**

**Tika belongs to Ravenpuff, a member of this site. However, my Round 2 opponent ended up being Swiblet and his character Zor. Not somebody I expected, but I did get a Defective. He's a great cartoonist - I'm not sure if I'll beat him, but I'll try my damnedest - and either way, post the results here.**


	4. Round 2: vs Zor

**Here's Round 2 vs. the kindhearted but powerful and snarky Zor. I hope I did him some justice; Swiblet seems to think I did. He sketched out his fight, but decided to withdraw from the match before inking more than half of it (it was an excellent 8-page comic; if you're on dA, feel free to check it out. In fact, check out the entire Blood-Sport competition). It's a long fight, I know; I write epic-length action sequences if I don't restrain myself.**

Disclaimer: I do not own Blood-Sport (owned by Blood-Sport's judges), Zor (owned by Swiblet), Vex (owned by Mech-Maker), or Irkens (owned by Jhonen Vasquez). I do own Domm and his gang, and the contents of this story.

**Blood-Sport: Domm's Journey**

**Round 2: Vs. Zor**

The sky was just beginning to lighten with the blue sun's predawn light. Of the four moons that had been visible in the sky that night, only the largest still hung in the sky, shedding a bit of light on the sea of huge steel crates, marred with faded graffiti and pockmarked with the occasional fresh burn or puncture. The air in the industrial zone was a bit thick and humid, being at sea level, and it stank of old rust, old concrete, old fossil fuels, old industry… and new blood. Horrible sounds, far distant, occasionally rent the air, but for the most part, the only sounds Zor could hear were the quiet crunches of his own footsteps, seemingly loud as a rogue Hogulus stomping through seashells.

Zor yawned and stretched, his shoulder blades creating soft popping sounds. Although sleep was entirely optional for the modern Irken, extended physical and mental activity could still create fatigue, and PAK-less Irkens were particularly vulnerable. His green eyes focused downward to grimly stare at the trail he had been following, and he continued along it. The trail consisted of blood droplets… with intermittent brownie crumbs. Evidently a life-threatening injury wasn't unappetizing enough to prevent eating on the go for some people.

To the untrained eye, Zor didn't look like much, and even a trained eye wouldn't notice much more. He stood taller than Domm, although not quite as tall as Vex had been, and wore nothing from the waist up except a watch that looked about as advanced as anything in the Empire. His long brown pants were rough and featureless except for the pockets he stuck his hands in, and his shoes were something dark-colored in the sneaker family. His green eyes didn't show much emotion besides fatigue and frustration, and he had no distinguishing markings. His only exceptional feature was his antennae, swept back over his head; there was no bend to them near the tips, only a blunt end, and a black sphere floated just before that, seeming to hold the tips of his antennae on by magic. There was a bend, but it was less than halfway along the antennae, letting the tips hang behind and to either side of his neck.

Zor blinked. The strange blood-and-brownie trail led here, a bottom-row crate with a half-open door. There was a bloody Irken handprint on the door, and Zor could hear labored breathing inside. Blood-Sport may be about killing, but Zor wasn't about to let some poor fool expire without trying to help. He was _better than that_, damn it, and he was sure many of the contestants didn't want to be here in the first place. He gathered his courage and plunged into the darkness.

"Hello?" The room had nothing in it except more drops of blood, illuminated by moonlight and starlight filtering in through bullet holes, leading toward the end of the room and stopping. Zor walked to the last droplet, and noticed a roughly circular hole carved from the ceiling. He effortlessly leapt up and pulled himself into the second crate. "Is anybody here? I'm here to help." His voice betrayed his relative youth. "Hell-oooooo?" _Please don't be dead already. And pretty please don't be a trap._ There were more bullet holes, illuminating more dark Irken blood against the grey metal. And they led to… a small box. A small box that smelled very good. Distractingly good, in fact, and Zor remembered painfully that he hadn't eaten since he had found out that Calico had been kidnapped.

"Are those pastries I smell?" He pulled open the box. There were a couple of brownies left, along with a black-and-white, a scone, and… what was that oblong thing down there? He picked it up, and his heart nearly stopped when he saw that it was a flashing plasma grenade. Thankfully, it was armed, but the timer hadn't been activated. "Looks like this idiot screwed the trap up." Zor concluded aloud, grabbing a brownie and taking a huge bite.

"There's a 'just desserts' line in here somewhere, but I'd rather not." Zor nearly choked, spinning around. Domm stood not ten feet behind him, right in front of the second-level crate's door, which was also open. "So, what did you enjoy most?" he asked, his expression unreadable with his goggles on. "The combined trail of blood and crumbs? It was to lure all types of contestants here, even if it did make the trap more obvious. The labored breathing? It was child's play to fake, even a Smeet could do that. How about the brownies themselves? They're home-baked by one of my teammates. They aren't poisoned, if you're wondering… I should know, there were ten more in there that I ate."

"Uh…" Zor chewed and swallowed. "Why did you lure me in with a very convincing fake trap?"

"You don't get it." Domm held something up. "Catch." Zor caught it with one hand, and his eyes widened. Another grenade, and this one was timed. "Here's a better line!" Domm yelled as he slammed the doors shut and threw the bolt into place from the outside. "_Savor_ the moment!" He leapt back, and watched the explosion tear the central crate apart. The lack of stability caused the uppermost crate of the three to collapse onto the wrecked crate below it, and the force of the drop allowed it to crush through the weakened bottom crate as well, reducing the entire column to smoke, burning metal, and slag. Domm had the urge to say, "Nobody could have survived that," but decided against it.

Instead, after watching for a minute or so and ensuring that nothing escaped from the hot, twisted mess, he took off down the alleyway between the crates, locating a specific crate that housed something covered in red tarp. He threw the tarp away, revealing the small construction vehicle he had found. With Lio's phone guidance, he had repaired it earlier that night.

As he clambered up, Domm marveled at how much it resembled an antique Irken war-cycle. Okay, it was much thicker and heavier, and instead of strategically placed sleek lasers or missile launchers it was covered in a haphazard assortment of claws, forklifts, steamrollers, and exhaust pipes, but it would do. Probably of Planet Jacker origin, judging by the clunky design, so it was a good thing he had a Planet Jacker mechanic ready and waiting. Pressing the ignition button, he felt the loud motor roar to life and grinned. Definitely close enough. He gunned the engine, driving the machine out of the crate and into the dawn.

--

"I can't believe how easy that was!" Domm yelled into his spider leg-mounted microphone as his vehicle roared towards the city zone. It didn't move too fast, but at least it was faster than most Irkens could run, at least without spider legs. Domm estimated he'd reach the City (and a wealth of better hiding places) by nightfall, but for the morning he appeared to be heading through a warehouse district (by the sea, judging by the briny smell that assaulted him). "I thought somebody who passed the first round would have sharper reflexes than that, but BANG! Hook, line and sinker."

_"We know! We saw it all!" _ Erris excitedly said over the radio._ "I tapped into a live feed for us. If I hadn't found that, we would have had to wait until primetime."_

"Really? You guys saw it? I didn't see that stupid camera drone anywhere."

_"I think they cloak until they want to bother you."_

"Yeah, that makes sense," Domm replied distractedly. "…Hey. Who did I blow up? Do we have any intel on him?"

_"Uh… let's see… Zor. Rogue Irken, never recorded as part of the Empire, natural-born… he was part of a freak show for a while as a Smeet, but he's spent his known adolescent and adult life as part of a rebellion force against the empire. Get this! He's got __**major**__ cash on his head!"_

"Really? Awesome."

_"I dug up his round one footage. Good thing you trapped him like that. With no weapons, he took down an Irken with an axe, and he didn't get a scratch on him. He used some kind of fancy powers. It was over in less than three minutes."_

"Is all this info on the Blood-Sport website?"

_"Some of it,"_ Edh answered._ "They've got some dirt on you and the company, too, Big Boy, including your eyes. Ooh… Raven looks good… I'd hit that… and I'd hit Raltz… and __**Holocaust**__, I'd hit that!"_

"The guy must've been pretty reliant on his powers," Domm guessed.

_"Agreed," _Lio responded._ "I mean, who goes shirtless into a survival tournament like this? He's an idiot!"_

"Yeah, what a…" Domm trailed off when he felt a presence behind him. He slowly and calmly turned around. Zor, not a scratch on his body, calmly sat sidesaddle on the construction vehicle. He turned to Domm and regarded him coolly.

"Hello," he said.

"AAAGHCRAP!" Domm turned the craft on its two thick wheels as hard as he could, and the thing rolled across the cement with a screech of protesting metal. Both Irkens were thrown clear; Zor landed on his hands and knees and smoothly rose to his feet, while Domm skidded across the ground on his side and scraped his cheek raw. "Ugh…"

"Well, I think I have your attention," Zor said. He blinked as Domm rose to his feet calmly, and nervously shoved his hand into his pocket. "You know, a normal Irken couldn't get up so quickly after that."

"If anybody invited 'normal' Irkens to Blood-Sport, I'd be insulted," Domm responded as he checked his cheek for blood. He found some. "Likewise, a normal soldier couldn't get out of a metal box with two live grenades like that."

"I try," Zor replied. "Say, what was with the grenades back there? I mean, what the hell, man? Is that how you serve brownies to everybody?"

"Well, you know, battle to the death and all that," Domm said, rotating his jaw as he tried to fix the throbbing pain in his face. He noticed Zor nervously fingering something in his pocket, but it was too small to be a gun. A switchblade, perhaps, or a lucky charm? "I don't have any qualms about letting some of my opponents live, but you need to impress me first."

"What?! That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard!" Zor argued. "So, what, I proved to you I'm not weak, so now you'll let me go? What about the people who need to survive because they're protecting somebody?"

"Well, if anybody's protecting somebody dear to them, I'm sure they can last through the first round against me." Domm smiled through the fading pain; he had formulated a few plans, he had some guess of the measure of his opponent, and while talking to Zor, he had subtly loosened up his body. In short, he was ready to stop stalling and start fighting. "But, you know, there's another requirement for me to let you off…" He leapt forward as the Grimm popped out of his PAK and into the air. "…_you can't have a bounty on your head!_" Domm spun around to catch it in midair and came out of the spin with a horizontal slice.

Zor quickly ducked under the attack, and popped right back up, driving his fist into Domm's chin. Domm flew backwards, but stopped himself from hitting the ground by releasing his spider legs, springing himself back towards Domm with a downward cut. Surprisingly, Zor dissolved into a cloud of dark spheres on contact with the saw's teeth, flowing around Domm and reforming behind him. "That's not going to work!" Zor grabbed Domm, pinning his arms to his sides and keeping the saw down.

"Nice trick," Domm grunted. "Where'd you pick that up?' He slammed his head back into Zor's upper jaw, trying to twist his wrist around so that the saw would catch Zor's arms (but it didn't quite reach). Zor responded by throwing him to the ground. Domm landed on his elbows and knees and quickly began to turn, but he was only halfway around when Zor's boot connected with the side of his head. "Seriously, I'm impressed," he added, rising from the ground and rubbing his head with his free hand. "Not 'stop attacking' impressed, but…" interrupted by a quick straight from Zor, he ducked under the fist and slashed at Zor's side.

Unsurprisingly (this time), the rebel Irken dissolved into spheres (quite similar to the ones on his antennae) and reformed behind Domm again. The instant he turned solid, Domm released one of his upper spider-legs, slashing at Zor. "Whoa!" Zor jumped away, but the very tip of Domm's scythe blade left a superficial scratch on Zor's shoulder.

"So I just have to catch you off-guard," Domm guessed. "The dissolution is reflexive, but not automatic. Interesting." Extending his other scythe, Domm began lashing out with them, one after another, like twin scorpion tails. Zor was forced to weave back and forth as Domm closed in, and when Domm stabbed forward with the Grimm, Zor was trapped and forced to dissolve again. This time he retreated several meters away from Domm before reforming, but Domm stabbed both scythes into the ground and slung himself forward, past the reforming Zor and made an upward slash for his PAK… except Zor had no PAK. "Eh?" Surprised, Domm was unable to check his swing, and lost air control, so he crashed to the ground on the same side as before (aggravating the ripped skin on his face).

"That's enough!" Zor yelled, and the dark spheres seemed to appear from nowhere in a cloud around him. "There's no bounty here for you today," he stated darkly. "I suggest you leave and never come back."

"I _suggest _you hold still," Domm yelled, launching himself forward in a slingshot fashion again. "It'll hurt less!" He slammed both feet into Zor's chest, causing them to roll backwards with Domm coming out on top, sitting on Zor's stomach. He lifted the Grimm, but a small black sphere knocked it out of his hand and sent it flying through the air. "Well, that's concerning."

Zor grabbed Domm's arm and threw him up against a rusted solid steel gate, and then gestured with his hands. A dozen more black orbs flew forward, and most struck, slamming Domm back harder against the metal, leaving small dark welts. Gasping, Domm pulled himself over the now-dented gate before Zor could bring the orbs around for another pass. "I can control how hard these orbs hit you, man," Zor warned. "That was somewhere between low and medium. It's time for you to wave the white flag. I don't want to fight, and I don't want to kill you."

"Crap," Domm spat. He was hurting all over, and some of the welts were bleeding a little, and he had torn halfway through his right cheek. Adding to that, he didn't doubt Zor could launch the orbs harder; in truth, the impact he had taken already was about equal to what somebody would feel when a bullet hit their Kevlar vest. Except he had suffered nine or ten of those impacts at once, all over his body. This power of Zor's was no parlor trick. And to top it all off, it was getting annoyingly bright outside. "You know what, Zor?" he shouted, drawing his Enigma. "Screw you! It's time to grow up!"

"Hey, screw you too, buddy!" Zor fired a few spheres in Domm's general direction. After waiting for them to fly past, Domm got up and squeezed off a round. He missed, but Zor was surprised enough to fall on his butt.

"I'm not your buddy, guy!" Domm fired another round at Zor, but the orb-empowered Irken was already scrambling away, throwing spheres haphazardly at Domm. Firing wildly in return as he strafed, Domm used a spider leg to pick up his Grimm and tuck it back into his PAK, and headed for the sealed steel doors of what looked like a warehouse.

"I'm not your guy, friend!" Zor got up and shot an orb at Domm, but Domm ducked and fired with the shotgun, grazing Zor with a bit of hot plasma and causing him to jump away with a yelp. Domm nervously glanced at the circular hole left in the warehouse door before pressing the green button that operated the doors' sliding mechanism. Thankfully, it still worked, and the doors opened with a hiss of cold steam.

"I'm not your friend, buddy!" Domm called as he ran inside. It wasn't a warehouse; it was a slaughterhouse. The entire place was at freezing temperatures, and a conveyor belt hung from a catwalk near the ceiling, lined with large hooks. Some of the hooks still had the decaying meat of some large animals on them, and many were bloodstained, but most were empty. Large machines and tables and circular saws lined one side of the massive room, and another held the stairs to the catwalk. Evidently, whoever took most of the meat and left didn't bother to have the power cut. Deciding to take in the sights later, Domm used his spider legs to jump to a front window fifteen feet off the ground and magnetically cling to its frame. Noticing Zor running for the slaughterhouse doors, Domm took aim with the Enigma, but Zor noticed him before he could fire.

"How many times do you think you can pull an ambush?!" he yelled angrily, flinging an orb through the window. It struck Domm a few inches above his left hip, tearing through his side with all the force of a high-powered rifle. Even worse, it was immediately followed by shards of glass from the broken window embedding themselves in Domm's abdomen. When Domm looked back on that moment, it wasn't the pain he would remember. It was Zor's teeth – they were pointed like some predator's, not the zipper-like crenellations found in most Irkens. They were even more alarming on an Irken who was normally so polite.

Domm stifled his cry of pain. "As… _as many times as I can get away with it!_" he forced out before dropping from the shattered window. Deploying his spider legs, he caught himself before his PAK smashed into the ground, and launched his protesting buddy back up to land heavily on the catwalk. He quietly pulled the legs in before Zor entered the warehouse, hoping to hide while he dealt with his wound, as he was dripping dark blood out both his front and back just above his pelvis.

--

"THAT'S IT!" Erris yelled. "Domm's going to get himself killed! Lio, Edh, we're _going down there_."

Lio got up with a fluid grace and moved to the engine room door. Pulling it open, he reached in and pulled out a stack of plasma mines that could be set to time, remote, or proximity. Clipping them to his waist, he turned to Edh and Erris and flashed them a genuine smile, his first in a few weeks. "Lock and load," he said slowly, relishing each word.

"There's no need for your hastiness," Edh said, "Unless it's… IN BED! What was I saying? Oh yeah. There's no need for your hastiness, guys. The Big Boy can handle himself against Shirtless Burning Love. There's no need to show our hand so quickly. I think we should wait for the fight to play out."

"Ugh… fine!" Erris snarled. "But if the Boss winds up dead, do you know where _you'll_ be?"

"Where, babe?"

"**SHARING HIS CASKET!**"

"Oh, sweetness! I've always wanted to engage in necrophilia inside a casket!"

"Ew… really?" Erris asked, her anger (and train of thought) completely derailed in favor of disgust.

"Mmm-HHHHMMMM!" Edh nodded, giving Erris a shit-eater grin. After a moment (and still wearing the grin) he added, "We still aren't going down there, _chica._"

"And I'm not putting away the explosives," Lio replied stubbornly as he sat back down. "Love these explosives," he muttered.

--

"Hello? Umm… I don't think you ever introduced yourself, although you seem to know my name?" Zor slowly paced across the warehouse towards the stairs (because he had concluded Domm wasn't on the first floor of the main room). "Maybe you could surrender now? You looked pretty badly wounded, and if you give me your word that you won't try to kill me again, I'll let you go on your merry way."

"You still don't get it… that's not how things work around here." Zor stopped. Domm was on the catwalk, dead ahead of him, all six spider legs extended. Domm had the Enigma in one hand, and the Grimm in the other, and held the scythe-tipped legs menacingly in front of him. However, the other four rested on the catwalk, supporting him. He was sweating and breathing heavily (for real this time), and there was a very nasty-looking patch of smoking green skin on his left side. "The Tallest are playing us all against each other, and they've got every advantage. If one of us refuses to kill another, we're just allowing some other Irken to do it later. That special person you're trying to protect? They won't let her be until you're the only heartbeat left on this world."

Zor was staring at the smoke wafting from Domm's wound. "Did I do that?"

"No." Domm shook his head. "No, I did that. I used a welding torch to cauterize the wound, for the sake of efficiency. I'll do some real first aid later. But listen to me, Zor, this is very important." He stopped to catch his breath. "I was wrong, at least partially. The bounty on your head isn't important. I had a bounty on my head once upon a time, as did my best friend, until I paid some black ops organizations an awful lot to have them erased. Zor… if you let me live, if you let ANYBODY live, they won't just hand her over to you. You'll have to take her back yourself… and I can help you do that.

The Irken Empire put all their rotten eggs in one basket, hoping they'd break each other. Wait, that's a bad metaphor. What I mean is, they're pitting us all against each other because they're afraid of what we can do together. Together, a well-organized team of Blood-Sport's finest could take on every Elite in the Massive. You and my previous opponent convinced me of that. Like an idiot, I took their bait and played along for the money. But for even one new worthy member of my team, I'd trade every penny I'd make from winning Blood-Sport.

Zor, I want to ally myself with you, to achieve a coalition victory in Blood-Sport. Anybody who genuinely wants to join us will, and everybody else… well, they'd probably fall anyway. There are some real sick bastards out there today, and together, we'll make sure they don't win. And when only members of our coalition are left, the Empire will tell us to kill each other for the prize. But together, we'll easily be able to reach out and take the prize ourselves, collectively plucking it like a low-hanging fruit. We'll share the riches, and we'll protect your friends from the Empire at all costs. And when that's blown over, Zor, I want to invite you to be part of my mercenary team, Dommination Industries. So, what do you say?"

"You want to team up with me now?" Zor asked.

"Yes."

_"Don't do it, Domm, don't let that little punk join!" _Lio complained over the headset.

"And when the Empire objects to this, you want to take them on _directly?!_"

"Again, yes."

_"No, let him join!"_ Edh argued. _"He's DREAMY! And-"_

_"Shut up, both of you! I'm trying to watch!"_ Erris interrupted, before Domm turned off his antennae piece.

"And afterwards, you want me to join your team of dangerous mercenaries, becoming a soldier of fortune who'll kill anybody for a price?"

"Did I mention that you'll be with your own kind on my team?" Domm mentioned with a tired smile. Although his fighting abilities were best-known, they weren't Domm's only talent: his salesmanship was also a major contributor to his success as a mercenary. "I'm like you, Zor. I have a special power, and I'm considered a Defective for it." Putting down his Enigma, Domm held up his now free hand, and his bare fingers crackled with an opalescent glow. "Everybody on my team has abilities far beyond the scope of their race, abilities that have made them an outcast. You'll be our fifth member, and you'll be accepted. Have you ever felt _acceptance_, Zor? I mean really. It feels damn good.

And if you're uncomfortable with assassinations and the like, you can be left off those missions. We're assigned to capture or defend more often, anyway. C'mon, Zor." Domm threw Zor a business card that read '**DOMMINATION INDUSTRIES**', with a phone number, fax number, address with coordinates, email address, official web site, and a little confident-looking smiley face. It had Irken antennae; like Domm, one of them was sliced off halfway up. It also listed the names of its members.

"You're Domm, I take it?" Zor said, after reading the card. "It's a very tempting offer… but I'm sorry, I can't take you up on it. You've already ambushed me twice. I don't think I can trust you not to double-cross me and sell me out to the Empire."

Domm briefly considered removing his goggles, temporarily blinding himself in an offer of trust, but decided it was out of the question. Besides his own lack of trust for Zor, he wouldn't be any help at all to this 'coalition' if he spent a week without his eyes. "Are you sure? I swear to you, this is as honest as I can be."

"I… I don't think I can take the risk. I'm not as gullible as you think I am."

"Looks like I taught you too well during this fight," Domm chuckled. He picked up his Enigma again, but didn't point it at Zor yet.

Tensing, Zor summoned a cloud of dark spheres around himself. "I'm sorry." Domm noticed Zor fumbling in his pocket again.

_Is something in his pocket controlling the orbs?_ the bounty hunter wondered. "I'm sorry, too," Domm said. "But it's the end of the line!" He promptly leapt over the edge of the catwalk. "You and your stupid marbles are dead!" He used his spider legs to cling upside-down to the bottom of the catwalk, and raced forward. As he did, he reactivated the Grimm and slammed the saw up through the floor of the catwalk, dragging it forward with him. The result of this was a spinning saw blade popping up through the middle of the catwalk and grinding towards Zor with alarming speed.

"They aren't marbles, and they're not stupid!" Zor hopped back a few times from the advancing blade, before hopping onto the railway and launching a few spheres down towards Domm. He failed to launch them hard enough to pierce the catwalk, and Domm responded by firing his shotgun one-handed up the outside of the railing. Although the shot was clumsy, a bit of plasma grazed Zor's arm, and he leapt over to the other side of the walkway, pulling his orbs into a long row in front of his right fist. He swung the fist down, and cleaved clear through the walkway, missing Domm but knocking him loose.

"Fine, they're magic 8-balls. Call them whatever you like!" Domm, still hanging by his lower pair of spider legs, began piercing holes in the catwalk with his scythe-tipped legs, hoping to skewer Zor. He missed completely, but the catwalk shook and Zor fell backwards off the railing, catching it with the crook of his knees. Now both Irkens hung upside-down from the catwalk with clear shots of each other, but with Domm's blood loss, Zor was the faster shot and launched an orb first, knocking the Enigma to the floor as Domm aimed it. With a roar, Domm swung himself back up to the catwalk, but Zor beat him there and caught Domm square in the jaw with a right cross, an orb clenched in his claws adding weight to the punch. Domm landed hard on his ass, retracting his spider legs, and Zor pulled his spheres into a horizontal ring just outside his armspan, and then set them spinning with enough speed to create a low-pitched whistle. "Whatever they are, they're handy," Domm conceded as he hopped to his feet. "I wish you had taken me up on the offer."

"You can't always get what you want," Zor said simply before charging forward. The ring of orbs tilted this way and that as he bore down on Domm, forcing the shorter Irken to dodge accordingly as well as shredding the railings. Domm couldn't get close to Zor with the chainsaw without risking getting his weapon knocked away (or losing his hand). Worse, the orbs were made of some unidentifiable material that he couldn't even scratch with his saw. He guessed they were solidified energy or dark matter, but there was no time for an inspection. Worse still, he was being backed up towards a control panel on a wall, which was a dead end. "What were your words exactly, Domm? 'End of the line', right?"

"That's right," Domm said with a smile. He slashed the Grimm in a downward arc in front of his toes, and jumped the distance back to the control panel. Zor looked confused until he heard the groaning and felt the catwalk shake under his feet. Before he could say a word, the walkway, stressed far beyond its limits by the battle's abuse, collapsed, dropping him to the ground.

Domm turned and set to work on the panel, which he was pleasantly surprised to find was the master controls. He was less pleased to find there was no power left to run the machinery, and that the refrigeration was on a separate power cell he couldn't reroute. Zor probably wouldn't be down for long, and Domm was about at the end of his stamina. He needed all the help he could get, and an active environment could even the odds. "Come on, come on!" he snarled.

"That was a nice trick!" Zor called out from below, scratched and bruised all over but otherwise fine. "Are you going to come down here, or should I shoot you down?"

"Stop being so fucking polite!" Domm screamed. "AGH!" In his frustration, he activated his powers again and pressed his hand on the control panel, hoping to fry the circuits. Surprisingly, the machinery in the room sprang to life, with meathooks swinging in an endless path along the remaining catwalks, circular blades spinning in anticipation of something to grind, and mallets pounding a conveyor belt for lack of meat. "Strange," Domm said. "Normally my powers get machines to _stop_ working." An orb whizzing by his head reminded him of the fight, and he instantly made a spider-leg-assisted leap for a hook at the end of a long cable, landing with one foot on the hook and one hand wrapped around the cable. It carried him diagonally towards Zor.

"What are you doing?" Zor yelled, shooting several spheres at Domm. He ducked, but one severed the cable. Domm cushioned his fall with his spider legs, and rebounded toward another, still holding the first hook by the remaining cable.

As he reached the second, he swung the first in a vertical circle and tossed it at Zor, who deflected the large hook with a dense cloud of orbs. "Improvising!" Domm answered. He severed this hook himself with his chainsaw, and ran towards Zor, swinging the hook around and in front of him.

"Okay, then, I'll improvise too!" Zor rolled under the hook, but before he had even gotten to his feet, one of Domm's scything spider legs lashed out. Zor leapt into the air to avoid it, but Domm relentlessly hurled himself after Zor and swung with his Grimm. Zor dissolved into spheres again, reforming behind Domm in midair. "See? You like shotguns – I can improvise one!" Zor sent a spray of orbs at Domm, but one of Domm's spider-legs magnetized onto a passing hook and carried him out of the way. "Dammit, you just got lucky!"

"No, I could have just used my legs to pull myself straight up instead," Domm laughed. "But this is _more fun!_" He threw the second hook at Zor, dug his scythe-legs into the ground again, and launched himself behind the hook.

"Fun? There's nothing fun about this! Only a blood-crazed idiot would think this is fun!" Zor created a round shield of densely packed orbs in front of him, causing the hook to bounce harmlessly off, and then blocked Domm's chainsaw with it. Reaching around the barrier, Domm grabbed Zor by the lower jaw and pulled, smashing his forehead against his own shield. "Crap, that hurt!"

"For a Rebel, you sure don't know much about fighting!" Domm laughed. The shield dissipated, and he charged through it, but Zor brought the orbs into a sword-like line again and blocked Domm's chainsaw, creating a shower of sparks. "And I'm quite offended. I'm no idiot." Adding the weight of his other hand, Domm pushed harder with his saw, and the sparks sprayed across Zor's bare face, arms and chest, forcing him back. "Blood-crazed, a little, but I pride myself on keeping my wits during battle!"

"For somebody keeping his wits about him, you sure are grinning widely," Zor said, using his free arm to shield his eyes from the sparks. "You're drooling a little bit, too." The orbs at the end of his antennae glowed, and a fresh cloud of orbs appeared around Zor, even thicker than the last one. "Here's something to think about with those wits!" Zor launched an orb right at Domm's face at point-blank range.

This time, Domm really did get lucky. The orb struck the extremely durable rubberized frame of his goggles directly between his eyes, and ricocheted off without boring into his skull. However, it did knock Domm away and pressed his goggles so hard into his face that blood began to trickle down his face from the outside of the frame. "Uhh… are you dead now?" Zor asked. Domm's witty response was a wet cough. Domm stumbled to his feet, and Zor whistled. "I bet your eyes hurt."

"My neck hurts, mostly. I've got whiplash you wouldn't believe… what about my eyes, now?" Domm felt around his face, and his hand came back bloody. "See, now you _have to_ die. I never let anybody touch my goggles."

"Never?" Zor asked with a nervous grin.

"Never." Domm struck out with both scythe-legs and jumped forward with the Grimm, attempting to trap Zor in a pincher attack. Zor disintegrated and reformed to Domm's side, and brought his leg up in a high kick. Domm blocked it with his free hand, but before he could bring his blades around Zor leapt up with the other leg, hoping to trap Domm's head and hand between his legs and scissor him to the ground. Domm turned his face to meet the approaching leg, and bit down on Zor's ankle. Hard.

"Mother-!" Zor, his back now hitting the floor as his attack failed to execute, launched several orbs at Domm, knocking him away, but wasn't able to focus and put enough power behind them to do serious damage. Getting his legs untangled, he rolled backward and launched more spheres nearly straight up, trying to bring the ceiling down on Domm. "You're a biter! Why did you have to be a biter?" Quick as a flash, Domm was out from under the collapsing ceiling. Using more of his now-near-unlimited supply of orbs, Zor parried Domm's bladed spider legs and his scythe, and then all four of the rest of Domm's spider legs. Wasting no time, Domm kicked Zor's bleeding bitten leg out from under him, but he rolled backwards on instinct, bringing many spheres together into a veritable wall between him and Domm.

"Do you really think a little wall will work?" Domm sneered, already tensing his legs to leap over it.

Zor flipped his hand, and the wall sprang forward, smacking Domm across the room like a swatted fly. "Yeah… it works." Domm bounced off the far wall and collapsed to the floor, coming uncomfortably close to the lip of a meat grinder that was churning away hungrily. "You ready to give up and leave while you might still be able to walk?"

"If you can't… get it through… your thick fucking skull… that that's… a bad idea…" Domm panted, "You deserve to die… right here… right now." Domm was in a bad situation. He was out of stamina, and far enough beyond his limits that he was beginning to pay for it. He needed everything right now, so he couldn't command his PAK to channel energy from one task to another. He had to end this right now. He got an idea. "Hey, Zor… you had somebody you…" he stopped to cough until his throat was raw, "…wanted to protect, right? What's her name?"

"If you must know, _his _name is Calico, and she's being held hostage by the Empire while I compete." Zor was walking slowly towards Domm now, the insults and personal questions baiting him forward nicely.

"I'll make sure… they don't do anything to her," Domm said, forcing his aching body to his feet. The wound above his hip had reopened, his face was caked in blood that hadn't stopped flowing yet, and he generally looked the worse for wear. "One last piece of advice… _watch your environment…"_

"Huhwha?" Zor asked, before quickly ducking as a hook nearly impaled the side of his head. Still in the ducked position, he laughed with exhilaration. "You thought that would get me, didn't you?" His laughter was interrupted by Domm slamming his chainsaw down through the back of his head and out the front, slamming Zor to the ground and pinning him there as the contents of his skull were blended thoroughly.

"…but mostly, watch your opponent," Domm finished. "And no, I thought this would 'get you'." He drew the Grimm out, turned it off, and cleaned it on Zor's pants. He then remembered he had turned his headset off, and turned it on again, bringing out the spider leg with the mouthpiece. "Domm here. He's down for the count."

_"You will be, too, if you don't stop the bleeding, Domm!"_ Erris yelled.

"Nice to hear from you too, Erris," Domm replied. "Plenty of time for bandages later… actually, yeah, right now." He got some more of the healing-agent-soaked bandages out of his PAK and started by bandaging the large hole in his side, since he was still deciding on how to bandage his face without obscuring his vision or keeping himself from wearing the goggles.

The small camera-robot from before materialized next to him without warning, causing him to jerk. It had a little round dent on its side that matched one of Zor's orbs, but didn't seem affected. "Hi there!" That same announcer again. Domm grunted in acknowledgement. "That speech you made about defying the Empire if the contestants unite… the Irken Empire and the Tallest don't look kindly on it, Contestant Domm."

Resisting the urge to say that he didn't give a bag of biological waste what the Empire thought, Domm instead casually responded, "You didn't believe that load, did you? My opponent sure didn't, he knew I wasn't serious." Domm had lied through his teeth before, and he knew how to be convincing. It helped when his eyes were hidden.

"Hmm… I suppose you're right. So, Contestant Domm, how would you rate this fight?"

"More challenging than the first," Domm replied. "Hey, the Empire is holding some Calico guy so this douche would fight, right? He's dead. You can let him go now."

"No can do, he was associating with Rebels. He may have been one himself; we haven't had the chance to interrogate him and find out yet. All our torture units have just been _swamped_ lately…" the Blood-Sport agent babbled on, until Domm cut him off.

"Let him go. Tell Tallest Purple that Domm asked for his freedom, and he'll stamp whatever he needs to. We go way back, but he probably doesn't recognize me in the tournaments. It's been a while."

"Really?" The thing swerved. "I didn't know Purple associated with Defectives."

"We were pen pals as Smeets, if you must know," Domm said.

Again, he asked, "Really?"

"Yes. _Go away._" Domm leaned down over Zor and pried his right hand open. Although most of the spheres dissipated when he was terminated, the one clasped in his right hand and the ones on his antennae remained. "Alright, Zor, I did what I could." He grabbed the orb and pocketed it. "But nothing's free. I'm sorry you wouldn't join me, Zor, I truly am." He wrenched the other orbs free from Zor's antennae, and put them away as well. "But regardless of your poor decision, you _will_ be of assistance."

**End of Round 2**

**Yes, I am the lowest of the low, who would rip off a joke from South Park. The setting is a partial borrow as well; from another Blood-Sport entry by the excellent Half-Dude. The meat grinder, hooks, and the like were all red herrings for my fight, though (okay, I did use the hooks a little). By the way, for those of you who aren't on dA and wouldn't know the other contestants and are wondering about who, exactly, Edh would tap... Raven's a female Irken. Raltz is a male Irken, a bit of a ladies man despite being a burn victim. Holocaust _was _a male Irken, and is now a radioactive skeleton inside a battle suit. Yup.  
**


	5. Round 3: vs Tark

**avatarjk137: Well, here's Round 3. Of course, some assets of the story won't entirely make sense unless you take a look at some of the other notable contestants, so I again urge you to do so. Everything can be found at blood-sportdotdeviantartdotcom. By the way, Aut (the scientist here) may probably be my entrant in the second Blood-Sport (and yes, there will be a second Blood-Sport next spring; if you like Invader Zim and action, and you're half-decent writer, I suggest you get a dA account and sign up when it starts).  
**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Invader Zim, Jhonen Vasquez does. I only own Domm, Erris, Auger, Aut, and the contents of this story. Alikatt91 owns Tark.  
**

**Blood-Sport**

**Round 3: Vs. Tark**

Stark, bombed-out and empty. That's what anybody would say if they looked at the office block. The paint on the buildings, perhaps once vibrant, was a light grey from fading and a layer of cement dust. Contrasted against a darker grey, overcast sky and the blackness of the gaping holes and broken windows decorating them, the structures almost looked white. This had been an economic district at first, until the war with the Irkens forced a hasty conversion into defensive installments; now they were just ruins. Ruined office blocks, ruined battlements… ruined civilization.

Tark knew better. When the red-eyed Irken, his face still covered in healing, poorly-cleaned wounds, had come across this complex, he had caught a few signs of life. Tire tracks through the dust (from a vehicle with just one row of tires) led to the block's parking structure; he had traced them to a light construction vehicle, shut down and locked into a hoverbike rack. He had found footprints leading from there, but once inside the building, the dust was less omnipresent and the tracks disappeared. Unfazed, Tark began to search every room of the building.

On the seventh floor, he found paydirt. A vending machine was humming... all the machines on the lower floors had been off and unplugged. Somebody had turned this machine on. Tark made sure to be as quiet and thorough as he could, searching the rooms. It didn't take long to find what he was looking for; the seventh room on the outside had an open door, and Tark heard a sigh from inside.

Preparing himself, Tark checked himself over. His blue-and-black uniform and silver-and-blue armor were in working order, if splattered with dried mud and a bit of gore. He extended and retracted his spider legs, making sure there was nothing interfering with the many joints. Next, he wiped some of the caked blood off his face, in the process making it visible that some of the wounds on his left eye and above his right were actually old scars. Finally, he drew from his belt a wickedly curved knife with a blue gem in the pommel, and held it at the ready before entering the room.

The room was a dilapidated office of some sort, but there was a couch in it, which must've been why the Irken had chosen it. He stood with his back to Tark, staring out the window. Tark could see from this view that the Irken was a bit taller than Tark himself, wearing a black and silver outfit that didn't look like anything the Empire issued. His PAK was far from standard as well; it was almost rectangular, and had too many panels. A rebel, perhaps? His eyes traveling upwards, he noticed the Irken had goggles wrapping around his head, and bandages under the goggles. One of his antennae was half-severed, but that looked like an old wound. The Irken was talking to himself – no, he was talking into a communicator as he finished drinking a soda (obviously one from the vending machine).

"What? You've gotta be kidding me… you're telling me several of the greatest killers of our time were taken down last round… who's Ethys? _No-names _took these guys down? Wait, the guy who took Xion down died _in a previous fight? _Bullcrap, Erris… yeah, I know you saw it, but the Empire's probably rigging those fights… it just doesn't make sense, is all…"

_Now's my chance,_ Tark thought grimly to himself. He didn't relish killing a distracted foe, especially one who was more wounded than himself, but if this Irken endured a couple of battles already, he was sure to be dangerous, and facing him in a fair fight could be too much of a risk. He gripped his knife hard enough that his knuckles paled under his gloves, and crept forward with moderate speed.

"Well, yeah, I'm angry. We're getting paid for Zor, but those guys might have been the biggest bounties in the tournament… hang on for a second." A spider leg tipped with a wicked blade unfolded from the Irken's PAK and lashed backwards towards Tark, who frantically blocked the swing with his knife. "A little eager, are we?" Tark bit his lip and looked at the window. Of course! He could see the Irken's face in the glare on the window. The reverse would probably also be true. "Why don't we introduce ourselves first?" the taller Irken asked wearily. "I'm Domm."

_His voice is a bit shaky… and he's leaning against the wall… how wounded is he? _"I'm Tark," he replied nervously.

"Okay then," Domm nodded, his spider leg still locked blade-to-blade with Tark's knife. "Listen, Tark, let's be reasonable here. This room is a poor location for a fight, wouldn't you agree? Too tight. No room to maneuver."

"I… guess so…"

"How about we meet on the building's rooftop in ten minutes?" That immediately rang alarm bells in Tark's head, but Domm began putting his suspicions to rest before Tark had even voiced them. "If you like, you can go up there first, to make sure there are no traps up there. I can follow at a distance, so you don't have to worry about sneak attacks. Or, if you'd prefer, I can follow close or even lead the way, so you don't have to worry about me running away."

Tark debated mentally, but finally he decided there couldn't be much harm in it. Besides, if the guy ran, he was too wounded to be much trouble tracking down again. "Alright, but I don't want to see you up there for another five or ten minutes." He turned on his heel and marched towards the stairs.

"Thanks. See you then." Tark glanced back a few times, but until he entered the stairwell, Domm stayed in the room. The rebel leader wondered if he could afford to be this trusting.

---

Domm waited a few minutes before restoring the commlink with his team. "Gullible bastard. So, who is he?"

_"Tark? His profile says he's a former Scientist and Soldier who deserted. He's also a suspected rebel, although the Empire didn't have any idea of that when they invited him. Why'd you send him up to the roof?"_

"Exactly why I said. It's pretty tight quarters in here; his knife is better than any of my weapons for enclosed spaces." Domm closed his eyes and removed his goggles, then began unwrapping the bandages on his head. It had been nearly a week since he fought Zor; the wounds had healed within five days (the one on his side had taken the longest because of the hasty cauterizing job), but he'd kept the bandages on so he could play up the 'I'm already wounded' bit. It wouldn't work again; he wasn't going to hold back once the battle started. "What else should I know?"

_"It says he's got a unique PAK feature called Beta, but it's just an alternative life-support system. Basically, he'd heal faster by going into a coma. It should be a non-issue. Besides that, he's shown plenty of skill at close-combat skills, with or without the knife. He's good with his spider-legs, too."_

"Okay, so I just keep him more than an arm's length from me. I can outrange him."

_"That's the soundest basic strategy."_

Domm began heading for the elevator; he would enter the roof on the opposite side of where Tark had, which was fine with him. "Where are Edh and Lio? The absence of Edh's babbling is noticeable."

_"Unlike us, Edh and Lio are not Irken and require sleep. Should I wake them?"_

The elevator dinged as its doors opened, and Domm stepped inside. "Nah, they can watch the rerun in the morning. Domm out." After a moment, the elevator opened out onto a blasted grey rooftop buffeted by cold winds. The evidence of war ending in defeat was stronger here: nestled among the air conditioning units was a shield generator, some critical parts half-melted. Turrets sat rusting along three of the walls; the fourth wall's guns had been entirely vaporized. Even the water tower had the scorched remnants of a plasma Vulcan cannon. Whoever had lived on this planet, they'd put up a good fight, but the Irken Empire had marched on. Domm stepped out of the well-lit steel box, and immediately spotted Tark inspecting one of the turrets; he just as surprised as Tark to see that there was still some live ammuntion in it. "Hey there!" Domm greeted, causing the shorter Irken's head to snap up. "So, Tark, I hear there's talk you're a rebel."

"Yeah, why?" Tark fingered his knife. "Are you with the Resisty, or what?"

"No, I'm a merc," Domm replied with a shake of his head. "A good cause isn't enough to get me to fight. A good paycheck, on the other hand…"

Tark scowled. "Maybe we should start fighting."

Domm extended his two bladed spider legs as well as his bottom pair, and held them close to his body in a defensive position. _No reason he should know I have six right off the bat…_ "Maybe we should."

Tark leapt down from the turret and cautiously began circling around Domm, knife out. Domm struck first, lashing out with one of his scythes. Tark ducked it and charged straight towards Domm. Domm struck with his other scythe, but Tark blocked it with his shoulder blade. "Not bad." Domm stabbed with his third spider leg, but Tark hopped over it, and when Domm tried to catch him in midair with the fourth, Tark parried it with his dagger. "Impressive." Domm relented and leaped to the side as he pulled the spider legs back in, staying out of Tark's range when he landed from the leap.

Tark merely growled and rushed Domm again. This time Domm lashed out with all four of his spider legs, striking forward and inward in a method Tark would have trouble dodging; as he expected, Tark parried the attack by deploying his own spider legs. Domm smiled and unveiled his third pair – his _magnetized_ pair – and struck forward. "What? Six?!" Tark was caught off guard, and the spider legs struck his shoulder pads. Domm activated the electromagnets, braced himself, and yanked the smaller Irken into the air.

"Well, well… it looks like I've caught one!" Domm used his bottom spider legs for extra support as he brought the bladed pair up towards Tark. "Let's open 'er up and see what's inside." He began lashing forward with the blades one at a time, aiming to rip Tark open; Tark frantically parried the blades with his dagger and the armor on his lower legs. "Come on, is that all you got? I can do this all night."

"You bastard!" Tark clapped one of the blades between his right shin and left calf, and drove his dagger into one of the spider legs holding him up. The leg sparked, and the magnet stopped working, causing Tark to almost fall, and Domm to get jerked forward and off-balance. Taking the opportunity, Tark threw his dagger at Domm, but since he was shifting all over the place, the dagger went a bit wide, only nicking Domm's jaw.

"Son of a BITCH!" Domm whipped the still-magnetized leg around, throwing Tark loose and sending him flying into the side of the stairwell. Domm checked the cut on the side of his chin, while Tark clambered to his feet, rubbing his head. "Alright, that's it!" Tark began to charge Domm again, but Domm was drawing a new weapon. "You just brought a knife to a gunfight." He lashed out with all of his spider legs as the Enigma warmed up, but Tark backpedaled, then jumped over the fully extended legs and stomped down on the shotgun, causing Domm's first shot to smash into the cement.

"You brought a shotgun?" Tark yelled, jumping off the shotgun to avoid Domm's rising fist. "What the hell kind of weapon is that?" He punched Domm in the face, but Domm ducked the follow-up and drove a punch into Tark's chest. Tark stumbled back, and Domm brought up the shotgun to fire again, but Tark ducked the point-blank blast and bumped the gun out of the way with his shoulderpad, throwing a vicious left hook into Domm's ribs. Domm hissed and kicked Tark, but Tark grabbed the leg, keeping himself too close in for Domm to effectively aim his Enigma.

"Oh, lots of the weapons I use are considered war crimes," Domm grunted, struggling as the shorter Irken held onto his left leg with one arm and pushed his shotgun away with the other. Quarters were too close for the spider legs to be much use; Domm had to settle for generally pummeling Tark with his free arm. "There's actually a funny story behind that…" Finally Tark let go. Domm stumbled back, but quickly recovered and swung his shotgun down at Tark like a club. "Would you like to hear it?"

"Maybe later!" Tark shoved Domm back again, and made a dash for his dagger. Domm attempted to fire before regaining his balance, but the recoil knocked him entirely off his feet, and the shot went wide, bits of plasma blazing between and around Tark's antennae. Tark recovered his knife and charged Domm, but Domm's spider legs had re-extended, and he was jumping to his feet to ready his shotgun.

"Fine, then, we'll talk about you!" Domm pulled himself out of reach on his four normal legs (aside from the magnets, his damaged leg was still serviceable), and blasted downward with his shotgun. Tark jumped backwards and extended his own spider legs, using them to jump into the air and kick Domm's shotgun away as he aimed another shot. "NO!" Domm's shotgun sailed end-over-end through the air, and finally disappeared over the lip of the rooftop. "That was made to order, you scumsucking pusbag!" One of his scythes pierced through the thick armor on Tark's leg, just missing the thin leg itself, and Domm began swinging Tark around, slamming his body against several turrets before tossing him away.

Tark, who had managed to stay fully conscious and hold onto his knife through the whiplash, weakly replied, "Does talking about me include insulting me?" He struggled valiantly to his feet, looking very much like he was about to throw up.

Domm lowered himself to the ground, regaining his self-control. "You're right… I'm sorry," he said, a dark smile splitting his face. "Like I was going to ask you… might you have a bounty on your head?" As he asked, he reached behind his back as a compartment on the top-center slid open.

One of Tark's wounds had reopened, and he was busy wiping blood out of his left eye. "Yeah, I think so. A small one, though; only for deserting, not for being a rebel."

Domm pulled out his chainsaw. "Good enough for me."

"GodDAMMIT, I thought you were kidding about the personal war crimes kit!" Tark pulled out his legs again and let loose with laser beams from the tips.

Domm hopped to the side and lashed out with a bladed leg. Tark ducked, and the scythe dug into the turret behind him. Domm yanked himself forward, chainsaw out, and managed to sever one of Tark's spider legs as he dodged. "I removed those lasers to make room for the other stuff. They're too weak."

Tark landed on another turret, and hefted out one of the pieces of ammunition from earlier. "Maybe this will have some more _oomph!_" He threw it like a shot put, managing to send it arcing the entire distance to Domm. Domm quickly extended his still-functioning magnet-tipped leg as he dove to the side, and he magnetized the artillery shell, spinning it around his body and slinging it back at Tark. Tark dropped to the ground, and the shell flew over him and hit another turret, creating a surprisingly large explosion.

---

"Hey, this fight's getting interesting!" Red yelled. "Anybody caring to make bets on this one?"

"15,000 on Domm! Chainsaw GOOD!" one of the guards, a pair of thickly built Irkens with muscles for brains, grunted.

"Good man!" an Irken bookie called, writing it down. "Anybody care to be on Tark? He's fast and tough for his height, and odds are three to two against him!"

"I will!" Purple's clawed hand shot up, showering hard pretzels around the room. "I'll bet ten liters unpopped of my personal stash of grade-T popcorn!" The other Irken VIPs present whispered excitedly. The 'T' stood for Tallest; grade-T snacks were quite literally fit for a king, and people who didn't frequent the Massive's bridge seldom earned the chance to taste such delicacies.

The bookie began rapidly calculating. "Value calculated at… 280,000 monies! Anybody want to bet their 420K against that?" After more whispering, five military captains pooled against Tallest Purple's bet.

Red smiled coolly. "You guys _dare_ bet against a Tallest?" he asked dangerously.

"N-n-no sir," one stammered. "W-we just wanted to take our chances, since we'll probably n-never get the chance to-"

"Oh, I'm just messing with ya," Red chuckled. "Purple, can I talk to you_ outside?_" He hastily pulled Purple out to the hallway of the _Massive_, then hissed in his antenna, "What are you doing? You don't have a private stash of popcorn! Are you betting MINE?"

"Relax, Red. I was just about to go rig the fight. We're Tallests, remember? We can do whatever we want, and _I_ say _I_ don't want to see a normal Irken lose to a Defective tonight!" He pressed a phone system located in his gauntlet. "Operator, this is Purple. Get me a Scientist who works with PAKs… the best on the ship!"

"But then we're rigging the match for a Rebel to beat somebody who will remain loyal as long as we keep waving Monies in front of his face," Red pointed out.

"Doesn't matter. In the end, Karis will win and the populace will love him. The other Irkens will all just have to die. Karis's handsome, tall, loyal… and he can FIGHT! We've set him up to win, and we haven't even had to rig a match in his favor yet! He's perfect."

"And if Karis dies by accident?" Red was nervous about a few of these. Xix was pretty frightening… and the fact that the first guy Xix had taken down simply got up and went on to take out another serial killer was worrying as well. A whole team of Scientists was trying to figure out what the hell exactly was up with 'Scientist' Dire, and even total unknowns like that battle chef were looking dangerous.

"Then we'll quietly have the champion killed, like our original plan was," Purple said matter-of-factly. Then two Scientists turned a corner and began heading towards him. "Ooh, that's probably our guy."

"GREETINGS, MY TALLEST!" The first of the two Scientists, who was slightly taller, was also very loud and enthusiastic. He was withered and ancient; older than anybody in Blood-Sport for sure, but he moved with verve and youth. When he made a ridiculously low, sweeping bow, his white coat flapped around enough that the reason he was so mobile be came clear: at least both legs and one arm were thin steel prosthetics. "Scientist Auger, at your service! I'm Head of Biomechanics for the _Massive_! What's mine is yours, all yours!" One of his antennae was threaded with wire, and sparked whenever he moved… so of course it was always sparking. Even stranger, his forehead was decorated with a… zipper. The second, shorter Irken mumbled something humbly in agreement and bowed, his purple eyes averted.

"Ah, Scientist Auger. You'll be helping Purple with his need of PAK services?" Red asked.

"No, sir!" Auger saluted, his red eyes bulging. "Scientist AUT here is our BESTEST and BRIGHTESTEST when it comes to PAKs! If anybody on the ship can help with PAK-related issues, it's him!"

Aut gave a tiny nod and another mumble. He wore his coat tightly around him, as if protecting himself from the cold, and with the collar flipped up. He also had a sparking wire on one antennae, as well as a scanner on that eye that was feeding him a data readout.

"He doesn't look like much," Purple said bluntly. "Are you sure he's so great?"

"Yeah, how great is he?" Red added.

"How great is he?" Auger asked incredulously. "Sir, _I'll tell you how great he is!_" Auger proceeded to _unzip his own scalp_ and flip it up, pointing his exposed cranium towards the startled Tallest and revealing… just a network of cables inside his skull. "I had a brain aneurysm a couple'a months back, and it blocked the signals my PAK sent to my body! I pretty much died! Luckily, Autie here flipped me onto the table, cracked me open, pulled out all my dead brain-parts, and installed some sweet gizmos! Now my PAK sends a signal to his PAK, his PAK beams a signal up through his antenna back down _my_ antennae into my skull, and as long as I have a circuit going with Aut my PAK's personality backup still runs my corpse!" He closed his skull. "How great is that?"

"Doesn't that put a lot of strain on him?" Red pressed. "I mean, he seems kinda distracted." True enough, Aut had been looking away and mumbling into his collar while Auger made his speech. Red snapped his claws. "Aut, we're over here. You were talking to yourself?"

"Wha – again?" Aut seemed to only then realize who had spoken to him, and meekly averted his eyes again. "Sorry, my liege," he squeaked.

"The boy's always been that way. Trust me, he's a GENIUS!"

"Alright then." Red looked at Purple. "What do you want a PAK Scientist for, anyway?"

"Okay, you know that contestant who lost to Tark last round? Spaz?"

"Yeah, what about him?" Auger asked.

"Can Aut recreate that glitch in his PAK that boosted his survival instincts and combat skills?"

"Abso-friggin'-lutely!"

"Can he do it by remote control into another Blood-Sport contestant… like now?"

Aut gave a tiny, hesitant nod, one you would have to be looking for. Then he began to whisper again.

"Give us ten minutes!" Auger said proudly.

"You have five."

---

Tark staggered out of the thick, oily smoke, coughing. "What the hell was that for," he hacked. "Overprepared nut."

"You're a nut! What a stupid thing to say to me!" Tark's eyes widened as he turned to see Domm pull back his chainsaw. The shorter Irken dropped to his knees, avoiding a swing that would give him a zipper on his head just like Auger's, and stuck his dagger into the calf of Domm's leg. Domm fell back, but pulled Tark's dagger out of his grip. "Now you really have to die!" Domm's main four spider legs extended again, quickly raising him back into a vertical position, and he kicked Tark back up to a standing position. Domm took another swing with the chainsaw, and Tark jumped backwards, barely avoiding the humming, whirling teeth. Too late, he realized he had jumped backwards off the building.

"CRAP!" Tark extended his three remaining spider legs, and caught the ledge with the upper two. One leg steadied him against the wall, and the remainder was just a useless stump that sat there and twitched. _That saw sheared through my spider leg like paper. What'll it do to me?_ He was jerked out of his thoughts by Domm, who was gazing down at him from over the ledge. Tark decided to try a different tactic. "Hey, merc…. Domm. How much would it take you to join my rebellion?"

"You want me to work for you?" Domm tapped his chin. "Let's see… right off the bat, you'd have to pay me equal to your bounty for _not_ killing or capturing you. Standard desertion bounty's 10K… we'd each increase our chances of surviving Blood-Sport, but lose any chance of winning, so I'd charge you for that… my entry convinced the Empire to drop two execution orders on me and a friend that they'd certainly reinstate, so that's 100,000 for me and twice that for Erris, because the Empire is so dangerous… add my 30 percent 'don't trust the client' charge… you're looking at over 400,000 monies, just for me to stop killing you. That doesn't even include my actual services. So in other words… it's more than you can afford." Domm thrusted a scythe-tipped leg down towards Tark, forcing him to swing to the side.

"Fine, I'll just kill you!" Tark tried to pull himself upward and give Domm a devastating uppercut, but Domm swung the chainsaw in a downward arc and forced Tark back down. He then swung at the spider legs keeping Tark on the ledge, forcing Tark to shift his position back and forth as parts of the building's lip were shaved off. With a yell, Tark pulled himself up again, feinted under Domm's keep-away swing, and pulled himself up over the building's lip and between Domm's legs, forcefully yanking the dagger out as he passed it. Domm screamed and lashed out with the scythes, scoring a shallow cut below Tark's PAK and shearing off one of the rebel's shoulder pads with the two blades. Using his remaining spider legs to help in his leap, he launched himself up to the top of the water tower and crouched there to catch his breath.

He heard Domm's spider legs clicking as he circled the tower, and ventured a peek over the edge. Domm wasn't trying to climb it; he knew Tark had a tactical advantage. Instead, Domm was taking the chance to bandage his calf (A portable first aid kit? How much did his PAK hold?). "Come on down, Tark, and we'll fight like men," Domm called as he tore the bandage from the roll and put the kit away. He rolled his pant leg back down, and continued taunting Tark even as he tested his leg. "Rapunzel, Rapunzel, let down your hair." Tark did nothing for several minutes, except scold himself for not having put some ammo on top of the water tower to throw when he had the chance. "Do you not speak standard anymore?" Domm called from below. "_'Rapunzel lass dein haar herunter'_!"

"I'm staying up here as long as I want!" Tark finally called back down.

"Last chance. Either you're coming down, or the whole water tower is."

"…You're bluffing."

"I assure you, I'm completely serious." Domm reactivated his chainsaw, and sawed through four of the six legs of the water tower, leaving only the two closest to the ledge intact. The tower began to groan, slowly tilting towards Domm. "All it takes is a little… push…" Domm extended four spider legs and slammed their tips into the water tower, pushing it back the other way. With the groaning shriek of fatigued metal, the tower began to tip over the ledge, with Tark hanging on for dear life. Finally, there was a small crash as the tower stopped, still just connected to its base, with Tark left hanging ten feet from the ledge. "How are the winds out there?" Domm asked.

"You think you're funny or something?" Tark grunted as he pulled himself up onto the tower's side. Looking up, his eyes widened: Domm was holding the chainsaw over one of the last two legs of the tower. "Please, no."

"In my business, saying 'please' doesn't make any difference at all." Domm hacked off one of the tower's two remaining legs. Incredibly, the tower still held on, although it jerked down at an even harsher angle and gave a sharp rotation back-and-forth. Tark managed to hold on to the tower's spinning, smooth thank by digging in with his dagger, and hanging onto that single handhold.

"Great, I'm dangling from my knife's hilt eighteen stories above the asphalt, there's a chainsaw-wielding maniac waiting for me at the nearest stable ground, I'm exhausted, and even if I beat him, there's probably a dozen more still around. How could this get any worse?" Water began squirting out around the dagger, splashing onto Tark's face and burning him. "I should never ask that. Stupid water-based civilization…" the pain was enough of a motivator to swing himself back up onto the side of the tower now facing upwards, and he pulled his dagger out with a sigh of relief.

"You're ignoring me again." He looked up to see Domm, who had stepped onto the side of the tower. "It's not very smart to ignore your opponent."

"Not very smart of you to try and fight me out here on unstable ground…" Tark gasped back, extending his remaining spider legs.

"I could've cut the cable, but I would've had to get down the building anyway to make sure you were dead. This is much quicker." To Tark's horror, the taller Irken turned around and slashed through the last leg of the tower. He quickly began to experience more than one kind of sinking sensation as Domm turned around. "Going down, sir?"

"NO!" Tark made a leap for the ledge of the building, but Domm's own spider legs extended, and one of them bashed Tark straight down, back towards the tower. First the tower sailed towards the ground, then Tark belly-up, and Domm plummeted after him feet-first, wind whipping around them. "Die!" Tark desperately threw his dagger straight up, but he missed, and Domm began dragging his spider legs against the tower, slowing his descent to safe speeds. Tark realized he could do the same and did, but he only had half as many spider legs as Domm, and was already too close to the ground.

A loud, terrifying noise tore through the dusty night as the tower crashed to the ground, soaking the ground and leaving jagged pieces of metal sticking up. Desperately, Tark pushed off the building's wall and tumbled screaming through the air, only to land hard on his side on the road. Coughing up some blood, he staggered to his feet and stumbled away, his only aim to get some distance between himself and Domm.

Domm made a gentler, more controlled push at the end of his slowed fall, and ended in a nearly flawless three-point landing. He rose easily to his feet… and clutched his skull in sudden agony as something struck his forehead and bounced off. "MOTHER OF DOOKIE! What the hell was that?!" He stared at it, rubbing the forming bruise. It was Tark's dagger, lying prone on the ground. Suddenly, Domm collapsed, shaking, to his knees as he realized just how lucky he was that the dagger had landed point-up.

---

Aut smiled into his collar. He had really outdone himself this time. A virus that created a perfect recreation of the glitch in the late Spaz's PAK. With the _Massive's_ software, it could be beamed into any PAK within twenty-four light-hours. He brought up a status report on Tark's PAK onto his computer screen. Tark was damaged, but not mortally. With the insertion of the glitch, he would likely be able to turn the fight around and win. Suddenly, he began mumbling to himself.

"Good work, Aut! I knew I recommended you for a reason!" Auger said proudly.

Aut blushed at the compliment. "Aww, you just did it because I made you."

"No! You really were the right man for the job! The Tallest will be so proud!"

"You're just saying that because I'm telling you to…" then Aut's expression changed, and he began to whisper words in unison with Auger's much louder speech.

"Whatever you say, Aut," 'Auger' said. "Whatever you say."

---

Tark had gotten almost 200 meters from his rough landing when the virus began to take effect. He was worried that Beta might activate on him at any time; when that happened, he wanted to be somewhere Domm wouldn't find him so easily. Of course, he was only counting on Domm and Beta as possible dangers.

The virus had been rather hastily constructed, and wasn't made with interactions with programs like Beta in mind. When the Spaz virus activated, Beta activated itself in response, sensing something deeply wrong with its host. The combination, of course, had unique side effects; Tark's immune system and metabolism began to go into overdrive…

---

_"You okay, Domm?"_ Erris asked.

"Y…yeah. Just a bit startled. Brush with death and everything." Domm had managed to recover his Enigma, which was somehow still in working order. Now he was looking around. "That little bastard gave me the slip. Erris, do you have access to a top-down view or some way to track him?"

_"I do, but there's no need. He just left his little hidey-hole, and now he's heading right for you."_

"Oh, really?" Domm charged his shotgun, relighting the orb in the front. His Grimm was hidden in his PAK again, and Tark's knife rested easily in his boot. He was ready for just about anything, but he was doubtful Tark had anything else to throw at him. With that in mind, he was just about to start assessing possible ambush spots when Tark simply walked into plain sight.

Even in this dusty grey moonlight, it was clear that something was wrong. To begin, all the wounds on Tark had vanished. Even the dried blood was mysteriously gone. Tark's eyes had lost their normal deep red luster; now they were an inky black that absorbed all light. His expression was unfocused, trance-like even, in sharp contrast to the anger-driven visage that had confronted Domm earlier tonight. His hands twitched, clenched, unclenched, spasmed. Even Domm was a little unnerved.

"Tark…?" Domm ventured, raising his Enigma. Tark's response was quick and brutal – he dashed straight forward with a supernatural speed, ducked under the path of the plasma spray as Domm squeezed the trigger, and drove a momentum-enhanced elbow attack into Domm's solar plexus. Gasping, Domm staggered back and collapsed onto his back. Tark hopped up and stomped down on Domm's already-tormented gut, then backflipped off, grabbed Domm by the ankle, and threw him into a lamppost, where Domm's head struck with a satisfying i_clang_/i.

"What the hell?!" Domm gasped. Tark dashed forward with his bizarre new speed again, but Domm slid down the pole and ducked Tark's grab aimed at his shoulders. Taking the opening, Domm blasted Tark point-blank in the stomach with plasma, sending him rolling. Then he noticed that the center panel of Tark's PAK had gone dark and was sparking. "I never attacked his PAK…"

_"I've seen that before. Somebody's hacking into Tark's PAK!"_

"Shit, really? Can you counterhack?"

_"I don't think so… but I'll give it a stab."_

"Stab quickly." Despite the fact that Domm's attack had nearly burst his lower torso open entirely, Tark was climbing easily to a standing position. His wounds were closing up, and… eating his shirt in the process? "The hell?" Tark rushed Domm again, and Domm blasted him with the shotgun again. This time, when Tark fell over, Domm blasted him again twice in the chest, and once in the head for good measure, leaving little more than a bloody mess with limbs. However, the limbs began to jerk with more and more life, and the body actually began to reabsorb the puddle of fluids around it as green skin and black eyes reformed without a scratch. "Erris?"

_"Regeneration. Highest-grade I've ever seen. Dangerously high-grade. His PAK is making his body consume his clothing for extra biomatter. On that note, don't touch him, his flesh will eat yours."_

"Lovely." Domm put his shotgun away and brought out the chainsaw. He stabbed down towards Tark's chest, but the subconscious Irken rolled free. "Would I have better results if I attacked his PAK?" Domm asked as he lashed forward towards the rising Tark. He managed to cleave off an arm above the elbow, but Tark punched him away with his remaining arm and ran to retrieve his missing appendage. Just by holding it in place, the arm reattached itself inside of two seconds.

_"That's the only option. I can't get into his PAK. It's on the network, but I'm being blocked by all kinds of firewalls. I think the Empire is doing this to him; I recognize their work."_

"Damn Empire. I'm demanding triple bounty on Tark for this." Domm slashed down through Tark's remaining shoulder pad (the metal parts of Tark's clothing were holding together much better) deep into his side. Before he could completely split Tark into two uneven pieces, Tark grabbed the blunt side of his Grimm and leapt backwards, yanking the chainsaw out of Domm's grasp before pulling it from his rapidly healing body and throwing it away. "Double damn." Domm unfolded his spider legs, but Tark was too fast, zipping around and between them and easily reaching melee reach. Domm managed to dodge a punch that would have snapped his collarbone, but Tark followed up with a vicious side kick to Domm's left knee which resulted in a horrible (or satisfying, depending on one's point of view) crunching noise. Domm screamed and collapsed onto his left arm and hip.

Unblinking, Tark picked Domm up and viciously slammed him back into the ground, cracking the cement a bit. Domm managed to punch one of his scythe blades into the side of Tark's head, which stunned him long enough for Domm to reach around, grab his foe's PAK, and activate his power. One burst of disruptive static later, Tark let out a nightmarish shriek, tore the blade from his head, grabbed Domm by the neck, and chucked him across the street before almost collapsing himself.

Domm forced himself up on his spider legs and did a quick check of his body. Not good. His kneecap was badly broken, a few ribs on his left side were fractured, his left elbow and wrist both seemed sprained, and he was actually missing part of his shirt and a bit of the skin on his chest and throat where Tark had grabbed him (Tark's own gloves having been long absorbed). The cut on his jaw had even reopened. Even worse, the pain was high enough that his electronics-disrupting energies were activating independent of his will, reminding Domm of why it was a Defect. He couldn't use either of his weapons even if he could reach his chainsaw, and he probably couldn't even rely on his spider legs.

Wait, he had Zor's orbs! Domm desperately pulled one of the three black spheres from his pants pocket and aimed it at Tark. _Attack him! Kill him! _No effect. He tried saying the command out loud, and only succeeded in regaining the recovering Tark's attention. He even tried shaking the orb around a little, then clutching it in a fist and punching at Tark. "Why did I even think that would work?" he sighed, repocketing it.

Tark hissed and dashed towards him with that supernatural speed again. He was no longer even recognizable; veins pulsed visibly below his skin, which was so brightly green it almost glowed of its own light. His black eyes held no spark of higher intelligence, none of the strong emotions and determination that had brought Tark this far. Most of his noble blue uniform (and even the blood staining it) was gone, absorbed disturbingly into his own body. Even his scars were gone. This was not the Irken who had attempted to sneak up on Domm a scant half-hour ago.

The glitching abomination reached for Domm again, but he hastily pulled Tark's own dagger from his boot and drove it into its owner's head, under his jaw. Tark gave a kind of gargling roar and began clawing at the dagger, trying to pull it loose. This gave Domm the chance to spin Tark around with a kick to the shoulder and grab his PAK tightly in both hands. Pulses of chromatic energy coursed from Domm's hands into Tark's life-support system, disrupting circuitry, then beginning to cause hardware fires. The primal subconscious force that had been controlling Tark screamed in pain as its very being was burned away, and darkness enveloped all.

---

"What? NO!" Red pleaded with the screen, but even a Tallest couldn't change what had just happened – the mug shot of Tark was covered with a large red X as Tark's vital information flashed along the bottom of the screen. It was just one message repeated ad infinitum - **'Critical Failure – PAK Damaged Beyond Repair'.**

"WOO!" The five military captains all joined hands and began dancing round the table they had sat at. The guard who had bet on Domm pounded his shock rod against the ground several times and gave a victory grunt.

"Ugh… you _lost_ my _popcorn_," Red growled to Purple. "My POPCORN!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'll make it up to you. Come on, let's go pay those Scientists a visit…"

---

"Ugh…" Tark opened his eyes, lying flat on his back, and the first thing he noticed was that the sun was rising. The second thing that he noticed was that he was feeling a lot of general aches and pains all over his body, radiating out from his upper back. Wait… he was lying flat on his back. Flat. On his back. He quickly reached around. Where was his PAK?!

"I'm afraid there was an incident after you passed out," a familiar voice greeted. Tark turned to see Domm propped up against a fence blocking off an alleyway. The weariness was back in Domm's voice, along with pain; it was genuine this time. He was wrapping bandages around his neck and chest, but stopped to point towards a smoking chunk of metal on the ground. The bottom of Tark's mind dropped out when he realized it was his PAK, burnt almost beyond recognition. "You have about 8 minutes and 45 seconds left to live."

Tark spoke through a dry throat. "What happened?"

"The Empire downloaded something into your PAK that made you act weird. You probably don't remember what happened, but for what it's worth you almost got me. I've revised my opinion on the Empire, by the way – I hate their guts."

Tark chuckled bitterly, forcing his burning body to its feet. "Good for you. I'm glad I convinced you."

"I have a proposition for you," Domm said suddenly. "Help me walk back to the building you found me at – you broke one of my legs. In exchange, I'll grant you a last request."

Tark thought about it for only a second – he could feel his Life Clock ticking down, and he couldn't afford to waste these precious seconds of lucidity. "Can you forward a message to my rebellion?"

Domm reached behind his head, and a two-way communicator rose from his PAK. He threw it to Tark, who had to catch it two-handed. His motor skills were already slipping… "I'm sure my friend won't mind if you dictate the message to her."

_"Hello Tark, I'm Erris. Why don't you dictate your little goodbye letter as you help Domm hobble back to the building?"_

"O-okay…" Tark walked over to Domm, and Domm gingerly put his left arm around Tark's shoulders, forcing his body up on his good leg. "Can't you use your spider legs?"

"They aren't working right now," Domm grunted. "I already tried."

"Fair enough. Um…." He spoke into the communicator. "Luka… and whomever else may receive this message…"

**End of Round 3**

**I'm planning to do an interlude before Round 4 (no idea who my opponent is, yet). Thanks again to those few who have read this far.  
**


	6. Second Intermission

**Hello again, ladies and gentlemen. It may surprise you to learn I lost the last round (albeit narrowly). However, one of the fights was found to have been judged improperly, and the wrong winner had been declared. Since you can't very well just take winner status away from the other contestant, both of those two advanced, and I was selected to come back to keep an even number in the fight (there was one other who lost as narrowly as I did, but she had been considering leaving the tournament anyway).** **Obviously I still need to improve, but I did make it into the top ten. This is an interlude chapter - stay tuned for the actual next installment.**

**Very LONG Disclaimer: I do not own Irkens, The Tallest or _Invader Zim,_ Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon do. The Talking Absol (known on this site udner the same name) owns Dire, RC0022 owns Lon, InvaderRaf owns Raf, Kiwiandcarma owns Kiwi, Mizucloud owns Ethys, Alikatt91 owns Tark, Irken-Maniac owns Niz, TheDarkestPrince owns Silver, and Critical-Error (known on this site as Cyanide and Insomnia) owns Xix and Tallest Black. I do, however, own Domm, Erris, Lio, Edh, Auger, and Aut. And the contents of this story.  
**

**Blood-Sport**

**Round 3.5: Second Intermission**

_"Would it have KILLED you to wake us up, Big Boy?" _Edh yelled over the transmitter.

"I didn't want to worry you. Of course, the fight turned out tougher than I thought."

_"Next time you don't want to worry us, don't let that handsome little devil break your leg!"_

"Oh, nobody else is going to be breaking my leg," Domm promised, gritting his zipper-esque teeth. "I can't believe the fucker escaped. Nobody escapes from Dommination Industries!"

_"Hold up, Domm. You have to hold your position, your leg is still healing. You put it in a splint yet?"_

"Yes, Erris, it'll heal fine, don't nag." Domm scratched the back of his head. "I've diverted all power from my lower body and half from my upper body into healing. I should be up and about in four, five days, ready to roll."

_"Make sure you get some biomass into your body; sugars would be best."_ Irkens didn't need to eat, of course, but it could still aid their bodies if they were in a bad way. And with a broken leg, a deep cut on his other leg, and some skin missing on his neck, upper arms and chest, Domm wasn't in a great way.

"Relax. I sat myself down by the vending machines." Domm had already consumed a bag and a half of stale cookies, along with a bottle of Dr. Jacker. "I have plenty of time to just sit back… and think…"

And think he did. What had happened after he'd used his powers to bomb Tark's PAK? The shorter Irken had managed to pull the knife out from his lower jaw, and slashed at Domm, regaining his upper brain functions even as his new aggressive regeneration program had crashed. Domm, startled and in quarters too close to dodge properly, had let himself fall out of the blade's path, but struck his head hard on the ground. He had stunned himself for a moment, and if Tark had been in possession of his full mental faculties, he'd be dead. Very dead.

Tark, fortunately, had been very confused, having essentially woken up in the middle of a fight with his wounds and even some of his clothes gone, and had ran like a Voot out of hell instead of finishing his dazed foe. By the time Domm had stopped seeing double, Tark was turning onto a side alley some distance away. Giving chase in his state would have been a fool's errand, so Domm had returned to the building he'd previously been hiding in, used his spider legs to drag himself back to the seventh floor vending machines he'd plugged back in, and laid himself down with his shotgun at his side.

Now all he had to do was stew with himself and wait…

---

"Ow, ow, GENTLE PLEASE!" Aut cried as the guard roughly threw him into the cell. Auger was thrown in behind him, not saying a word as Aut huddled up and whimpered. Aut could've stayed curled in the fetal position for minutes, or it could've been days; he completely faded out of time until he heard – and only just barely, for their hover belts ran quiet – the Tallest float up to the cell door.

"Ugh, this place is nasty," Purple said, looking around. "Next time, we should just have the prisoner shackled and brought to us. Actually, I didn't even know we had a brig."

"Well, we're already here," Red growled. "Let's just talk to the punk and go." He turned to Aut. "We lost a lot of good snacks betting on your tech, kid. You're lucky we don't just throw you both out the airlock; I'm still thinking about it."

Aut started crying.

"AWWW!" Red cried, not in pity but frustration. "Aww, come on, that's just pathetic! What kind of Irken breaks down and cries like that?"

"He's – he's really sensitive," Auger managed. "Look, my Tallest," – there was that ridiculously low, sweeping bow again – "Aut wasn't ordered to win for you. He was ordered to install the glitch from Spaz. If you'd ordered him directly to program something that would make Tark _win_, I guarantee you'd have won the bet!"

"Really?" Purple asked skeptically.

"Absolutely. Please, just give the kid one more shot. ANYTHING, as long as it requires his skill! I swear, he's a freaking PRODIGY!"

"Actually – actually," Red raised a long, clawed finger. "I think we may have an opportunity for you to prove yourselves again."

"YOU WILL?!" Auger bowed again, and again, "Oh, thank you, my Tallest!"

"For now, we're going to leave you in the cell so you can think about how you won't screw up again," Red continued sternly, "but your chance will come soon enough!" He floated away.

"You won't regret it, sir!" Auger called.

"Yeah, um… I'm sure we won't!" Purple insisted as they floated away. "What won't we-" he cringed as a high-pitched scream wafted out of the jail cell they had just visited. Then he tried again, "What won't we regret?"

"If those two want to test their skill so badly, then we'll set them up in just the right _environment_ to test their skill," Red said, winking obviously. "Get it?"

"No…"

"UGH! Why do I bother? Look, it's like this…"

---

Domm carefully removed the splint and put weight on his leg. He felt a slight, dull ache, but nothing serious. Carefully, he began to walk around the room, first slowly and then at a brisk pace. No problems; the pain even quickly disappeared. Experimenting, Domm ran across the room, leapt a few feet into the air, kicked off the wall, and backflipped into a perfect landing. His leg was working at full capacity.

This was good. This was very good. Domm had been going insane just lying there; no matter what he thought about, it eventually bored him. There was always the commlink, but Domm was wary of making too much noise, Lio wasn't much for socialization, Erris was lousy for extended small talk, and Edh usually began to drive him crazy after the first forty minutes of babble. Domm scratched absently at his new vest; it turned out that among the cluster of vending machines was a bizarre one that this particular culture had invented. It was a vending machine for shirts; you entered in the garment type, style, and color, the machine scanned your measurements, and a shirt dropped out the bottom. Since his own shirt was shredded, Domm had hotwired the machine to make him a black vest with a single white 'X' across the front. The clothing was satisfactorily snug and comfortable, didn't slow his movements with weight or bulk, and didn't irritate the exposed patches of skin under his shirt. It even had a hole in the back, pre-cut for his PAK.

"Erris," he said, suddenly initiating the connection, "This is Domm." Erris didn't sleep, and D.I. had shut down active operations for the duration of Blood-Sport, so he would be able to contact her at quite literally any time, and she would be available. "My leg is healed up. Do you have any idea who's closest to my location?"

_"Hard to say, there are two or three about equidistant from you right now. Listen, Domm, interesting news. Earlier today, another death brought Blood-Sport down to the final ten. At this point, I should probably just give you info on __all the remaining Blood-Sport candidates, right?"  
_

"Yeah, that's a good idea. Who's left besides me?"

_ "Well, first is Tark, but you already know what you need to about him. Since fighting you, he found an old battlefield and restocked on weaponry a bit, but that's it._

_"Second is Raf. He's a bounty hunter endorsed by the Irken penal system – I think we've competed with him for bounty heads a few times. A little guy, but he took down the fan favorite last round, so I wouldn't underestimate him. He's got a variety of standard and special-issue Irken weaponry, but nothing we haven't seen before. Be warned that he may still have a sniper weapon. Raf doesn't have many defining features; he's short and has dark red eyes, and wears a half-cape. That's all I got._

_"Your third possible opponent is Lon. He's an old veteran soldier, with the wounds to prove it. He doesn't seem to currently be armed, but if he gets his hands on a weapon, I can guarantee you he'll know how to use it. Lon should be easy to ID, he has no lower jaw unless he puts his prosthetic back, and even then it's obviously metal._

"_Scientist Dire is still an unknown factor, since all his cameras go missing. Whatever he's doing, it obliterates the bodies from existence. Don't underestimate him. He's got blue eyes and a lab coat, so you'll know him if you see him._

"_There's another Irken in a lab coat; Ethys. He's real tall, and wears this really weird head brace that looks like a candy cane; he's totally unmistakable. Anyway, he's a trapper who uses wires and poisons. I didn't think he had it in him, but he's the guy who took out a Royal Fiver, so keep an eye on him."  
_

"A wolf in sheep's clothing or a sheep in wolf's clothing?" Domm wondered.

_"That's the question of the day. Anyway, next we've got Kiwi. She happens to be the last girl in the tournament, but she's certifiable. Knife nut, but she's also got a plasma pistol and a sword. She's got purple eyes… kinda. Look, she's the only girl, that's all you'll need to single her out._

"_Then we have Silver. Tall son of a bitch. He's just a high-ranking soldier, but a damn good one. He's got a bunch of shit in his PAK, including a beam sword, and he's the only other Irken to have picked up a vehicle. You'll recognize him by height, silver eyes, and a long scar on his arm._

"_Niz is the guy who shook off getting killed, which says something. He's an umbrakinetic – shadow control, you know."  
_

"I know," Domm scoffed, pretending to be offended.

_"He's pretty tough and really resilient, so I recommend taking him apart and keeping the pieces away from each other. He's short, wears a mask-thing over his head, plus lots of black. Has orange eyes unless he's using his powers a lot, and then they turn black. He talks in a big, judgment-y way._

_"Which brings us to the ninth and last… Xix. He's some tall psychotic, and the dark horse. He's… well, he's just plain dangerous. Remember Tallest Black?" _ Erris didn't wait for an answer. _ "She wasn't in charge for long, but she was around long enough to experiment on some poor sap and turn him into this. He's taller than you, but not as tall as Silver or Ethys, has black eyes and pale skin, and he can travel through shadow – I think. Has a pain threshold to be jealous of, too. This is the guy who took down Niz the first time, and I think he's probably the scariest thing left."  
_

"I'm pretty scary myself," Domm stated quietly. Suddenly, the building shook with the sound of an impact.

_"What was that?"  
_

"It came from the roof; I'll got check it out." Engaging his spider legs, Domm raced up the stairs. 11 flights of stairs later (which were quickly traversed with the help of spider legs), Domm was out on the roof. What he saw was a little surprising – a thick, cylindrical rocket had crashed down into the roof at a steep angle, fracturing it badly. The jet of the rocket had fallen away from the chassis, but a meter or so of metal still protruded out of the cracked concrete. "A big rocket…" Domm muttered. Suddenly, the bottom opened along a hidden seam, revealing the rocket's cargo… steaming, bubbling nachos. The rocket was a whole barrel-sized tub of them! "Erris, the rocket's full of nachos. I'm not making this up, but I may be hallucinating."

_"You aren't. The little camera-drone's behind you, I can see it very clearly."_

_"CONTESTANT!" _the camera drone suddenly screamed, causing Domm to jump about a foot in the air. _"As you can see, we have sent you, one of the final ten survivors, a gift to keep you going. Each of the other nine Blood-Sport survivors received a nacho rocket as well. Consider it a GIFT!"_

"Well, that explains the nachos," Domm said aloud, although the camera drone remained silent. He stepped forward and took a nacho gingerly in his claws. They seemed to be regular, crispy tortilla chips coated in hot, melty, zesty cheese. "Should I try them?"

_"Well, they may be poisoned, but that isn't how the Empire usually rolls," _Lio pointed out.

_"Yeah, Irkens never give snacks as a FAKE gift," _Erris agreed. _"At least, not the Empire. It goes against tradition. I say go for it."_

"Down the hatch, then." Domm took a bite of the nacho. It was hot and burned his tongue a little, but he didn't detect any poison. In fact, it was a genuinely high-quality nacho – not a grade-T snack, but quite good. Domm waited a few moments, then took another bite. "It's good."

_"Aww, those nachos look delicious!"_ Edh yelled. _"Not as delicious as YOOUUU, though…_

"Shut up, Edh," Domm chuckled, then began coughing as he realized something. "Wait just a minute…"

_"Are they poisoned?!"_

"No, it's not that…" Domm looked around, his mismatched antennae perking. In the grey dusk, he could see a few wispy trails of lighter white-grey – steam. He looked down at the nachos, then up. The steam from the nachos and smoke from the crash intermingled, creating a trail of cloudy vapor leading up into the sky. "Guys, I can identify the exact locations of the others by the trails from these rockets.

Erris swore loudly on the other end of the line. _"Domm, if you can see them, they can see you! Get OUT of there!"_

"Not just yet. The way I see it, I've got three options. First, I can set up a trap, hoping others will notice the smoke and come after me particularly. Second, I can run, but that's a coward's way out. Third, and this is what I'm gonna do…" Domm paused to take a bite of nachos. "I can chase these smoke signals, and hope somebody's there when I get there."

_"Careful, Big Boy," _Edh warned._ "They've probably all noticed as well, and taken one of those options. Heh… the Empire FIRED its ROCKET at you… get it?"_

_"Try and kill somebody this time, make some cash," _Lio added. _"I don't work for peanuts."_

"_It's a penis joke!"_

"_Shut UP, Edh,"_ Erris growled. _"Alright, Domm, the rocket that landed due south of you is closest – only about four kilometers away."_

"Ready or not, here I come," Domm chuckled, making for the construction cycle he had found – but not before grabbing another big handful of nachos for the road.

**End of Chapter**

**So, yeah, I gave a little shout-out to the other contestants (and some info for those of you who are only following my fic). Xix can be seen here on this site in the fic _Avarice, _where he originates. Likewise, Dire is the only major OC in _There's Always a Light in the Darkness. _I recommend both fics whole-heartedly, although neither is complete yet. Ethys is the one I'm fighting next. Besides that, I'm also setting up Auger and Auf for future story use.  
**


	7. Round 4 Part I: Vs Ethys

**Howdy to anybody still tuning in! I just want to thank you again for your continued readership, and a special thanks to The Illustrious Crackpot for her continued reviews! I've made it to the semifinals of this tournament, and am writing my battle for Round 5 currently. In the meantime, I'm posting the first half of Round 4 (it came out to over ten thousand words, so I'm splitting it in half). Enjoy!**

**Blood-Sport**

**Round 4: Hell Is**

He was tall. He wasn't standing up straight, but he was obviously tall. Taller than Vex or Zor, certainly taller than Tark. He could probably even be passed off as a Tallest if he weren't such a freak. Domm frowned, antennae pressed close to the curve of his skull, and whispered into the communicator. "This is Ethys, I presume?"

_"Who else?"_ Erris snapped. _"What are you gonna use on him?"_

"I'll try my hand with Vex's rifle. It's got more range than any of my stuff, and I just want to end this. Bang bang bang, Ethys leaks out and I empty his pockets for the next one. I won't like it, but honestly I like getting to know these guys before I kill them even less."

_"You're cold-blooded, you know that, Domm?"_ Lio chuckled.

Domm was focusing on the hapless scientist so closely that he almost responded that Irkens were, in fact, warm-blooded. He caught himself in time. "Yeah, I guess I'm just a motherfucker that way," Domm said glumly.

_"S'alright. Irk knows I wouldn't follow you any other way."_

The fact that Lio was the only Planet Jacker Domm had ever met who used Irken phrases bothered him every time, but Domm just had bigger fish to fry. Ethys didn't look all that threatening at first glance – and when he first 'entered' (read: was forced into) Blood-Sport, he hadn't been threatening at any glance. He wore a jacket, pants and boots, all white, along with a brace down the front of his face that looked like a pointed bit of thick candy cane. He had a thin, almost feminine build, even by thin, androgynous Irken standards, a staple above his left eye, and apparently that brace was the only thing holding his head up. Even his antennae were strange and unthreatening; instead of the 'flags' hooking backwards, his curved forward and outward, looking like aerodynamic fins when held back against his head.

Now, though, he was a little different. There was a deep, wide, nasty fresh scar under the brace, carving out part of his face between his eyes and mouth. His jacket was half-torn away in front, revealing several more fresh scars and a lot of dried blood along his abdomen. Another freshly healed wound crossed his shin horizontally, further staining his white clothes with deep green Irken blood. But it wasn't all the healed wounds and dried blood, it was the way he moved. A dart here, a twitch there. An air of vicious desperation in his scarlet eyes, bordering on madness. Antennae pressed so far back they almost dug into his skin, and a nervous chew on his upper lip, then his lower, then his upper again. He crouched against his nacho rocket, which sat calmly in the parking lot of some large abandoned store. He didn't sit, calm and complacent; no, he crouched, obsessive, a prey animal that had made the choice to stand and fight instead of flee. A prey animal that knows there's a predator… somewhere…

Domm squeezed off three rounds from Vex's rifle, perched perfectly on the roof of a half-bombed-out Trillen-Vortian bistro diagonal to the parking lot. His aim wasn't as perfect, and the bullets punched into the rocket inches behind and to the left of Ethys's head, causing him to "Meep!" and scramble around so that the nacho tub was between him and Domm's general direction. Domm cursed; he had ruined his cover! He was so out of practice with rifles, and Vex hadn't had enough ammunition left for Domm to waste any shots practicing. Holding the rifle at the ready, Domm jumped off the roof, bracing his fall with two pairs of spider legs. His demeanor was calm and detached, more befitting a bill collector than one about to perform what he viewed as a mercy killing.

"Come on out and face me, Ethys," Domm called. "You've done very well for yourself so far, but it has to end sometime. You didn't think you could actually _win_ the Blood-Sport, did you?" As he spoke, Domm crept closer to the vat/rocket. "There are too many here to whom killing comes naturally. For you, it will never be anything you don't have to force, and that's healthy in most situations. In Blood-Sport, however, it will be your ruin." He was close enough, and he quietly extended his bladed PAK legs, measuring out the distance. "Why don't you come out here so we can end this quickly?"

"Like hell I will!" Ethys called. His voice had a nervous quaver to it, but he wasn't the stuttering wreck Domm had expected.

"Have it your way, then," Domm said. He brought the two scythes curving around the vat to meet right where he guessed Ethys was, and raised the rifle in case he jumped over. Instead a small silver orb with a single seam across it flew into the air over the vat, and Domm's spider legs closed on thin air. Reacting instantly, Domm sprayed bullets at the orb, one bullet denting it and knocking it downwards. Ethys hopped out from behind the vat, having wheeled backwards to avoid the blades. Domm noticed Ethys had procured a weapon, a small mesh sack with lots of jagged bits of broken glass sticking out all over. It was on a length of wire, allowing Ethys to use it as a flail, and Ethys had already thrown it towards Domm. Even as Domm deflected it with another spider leg, he had to be impressed – it was the cleverest improvised weapon he had ever seen.

Domm brought the rifle down to take aim at Ethys, but a hiss and a small explosion interrupted him. The orb he had shot at turned out to be a grenade – a steam grenade, and it was releasing a hot cloud of vapor with alarming speed. Ethys vanished behind the steam, and Domm desperately shot a half-dozen bullets into the cloud. However, when it dissipated, Ethys was gone, and there was no trace of blood. Domm looked desperately around the darkening lot, only to perk up at a slamming sound – Ethys had vanished into the abandoned building. "Shit," Domm sighed.

i_"If you go in there, you'll probably be playing right into his hands."_

"Yeah, I know," Domm sighed, moving to take a bite of Ethys's nachos. Before he did, he stopped and inhaled from them deeply. "These smell different from mine." Suddenly, he threw away the handful he had grabbed and wiped his fingers on the side of the rocket chassis. "POISON! Ethys certainly lives up to his rep."

_"Better watch out, Big Boy,"_ Edh laughed._i"Bishie Ethys is __**toxic**__!"_

"I've noticed."

---

_Hmm… the amnesia pills may have been laying it on a little thick. I should've just poured in some of the strong stuff; it's lethal and odorless. Yes, I'll use the strong stuff next time._ Ethys turned away from the smeared window. _Now, aisle eleven had darts and javelins, right?_

---

_"You're sure you want to follow him in?" Erris asked cautiously. "He's-"_

"Erris, **enough**. If you were in my situation, my merely asking would make you do it. Well, now I understand how you feel. The Tark thing has been bothering me all week." Domm retracted all his spider legs and kicked the door open, scanning the dark store with his rifle point as much as his eyes. "We are Dommination Industries. We finish what we start. That is all."

A light flickered on, and Domm's mouth dropped open. The store was deceptively large, with the bulk of it in a sort of pit several steps below the entrance's level. It was a sports superstore. Aisle after aisle, filled with nothing but sports equipment. Running shoes, deodorant, athletic supporters for several species. Balls, hoops, goals, posts of all sorts. Sticks, rods, gloves, any accessory you needed for your sport. There were even hunting-grade firearms, alongside paintball and pellet guns. The building had survived the organic sweep entirely unharmed, except for the layer of ashen dust that coated almost every surface. _Almost,_ Domm thought to himself, noticing a few sets of footprints. Picking the rightmost set of three footprints, Domm strode carefully to an aisle in the pit, noticing that it seemed to mostly hold equipment for Conquerball, a sport invented by Irken adolescents a few hundred years ago that had spread to galactic pop culture. The best way to describe it in Earth terms would be to call it an intriguing mix of dodgeball, baseball and capture the flag, but with more leaping and a little more screaming.

Domm found it all frankly a bit nostalgic, but he kept an eye out for Ethys and listened closely for breathing or anything else that could give away the lanky scientist. What he didn't keep an eye out for was the tripwire. One moment, the mercenary was creeping along, and suddenly a thin, cold line was drawn across his shin and he felt something pulled off the low shelves on either side of him. "CRAP!" he screamed as the two somethings hit the ground. "Wait…" They were just two empty shoeboxes – but shoeboxes didn't belong in this aisle…

He didn't have long to ponder this before what he had taken to just be specks of material in the corners of the shoeboxes to suddenly burst. Another cloud, different from the steam from before, poured out from the shoeboxes, and Domm's senses began to scream as he caught even a whiff. _Tear gas!_ Domm's goggles and closed mouth let him avoid the worst of it as he leapt back, but Irken skin is more porous than that of humans (especially where their nose would be), and Domm was still sent reeling from the pungent stuff. Frantically, he sprayed bullets in every direction, his finger not easing off the trigger until he heard the telltale _click_ and the stream of ammo suddenly stopped.

Clutching his head, Domm fell to his knees… the gas must've been incredibly strong, as Domm had barely caught a whiff and he could hardly think. It took a moment of deep breaths, his sleeve covering his lower face, before he could focus again (which was critical – without a degree of focus, Domm couldn't operate his spider legs, and his 'static' power might overload, even turning on his own PAK). Sighing with relief, he looked up, only to yell in surprise and roll out of the way from Ethys' improvised flail. Taking his chance, Domm charged the scientist, hoping to take advantage of his overextended weapon. Surprise registered on Ethys' face, but he recovered quickly and another orb dropped from his sleeve – this one silvery white, with a single red dot.

Domm had jumped warily back before he realized that Ethys wouldn't drop a really dangerous one at his own feet. He was right – the grenade simply burst into a cloud of greasy black smoke that Ethys vanished under. Shouting angrily, Domm stabbed five of his spider legs into the cloud, hoping to skewer the trapper. One of his spider legs caught something and Domm heard a strangled cry, but then Ethys's ball and wire jerked back towards its owner and caught the back of Domm's left shoulder on the way. Domm, already off-balance from thrusting the spider legs like that, was knocked to his knees and clutched at the various shallow cuts the broken glass had left on him. _Great, my new vest is wrecked, and to top it all off, Ethys has disappeared again._ All Domm had gotten was a bit of Ethys's jacket and blood on the tip of one of his spider legs for the effort.

Something suddenly occurred to Domm – Ethys hadn't talked at all yet, except for one short line. All his other opponents so far had been more talkative, even Vex, who had been the 'quiet hunter' type. _That could be to my advantage. Whether he's afraid of me or just trying to focus, a little well-placed cross-chatter can make all the difference in the universe._ "What's wrong, Ethys?" Domm had shrugged off the tear gas by now, and was slowly backtracking, keeping his eyes peeled for Ethys. "Don't want to face me out in the open? Can't say I blame you…" Putting another clip – his last, or rather, Vex's last – into the rifle, Domm strolled into another aisle. This time he kept his eye out for tripwires or alarms of any sort (at any height), but didn't see any. "What's the saying? Discretion is the better part of cowardice?" He carefully sidled around a poorly placed dartboard display. "Come on, fight like a man."

"If you insist!" Shocked, Domm spun on the spot. Ethys had snuck around behind him to block the entrance to the aisle, and had planted his feet in a genuinely threatening and defiant stance. The anger in the scientist's scarlet eyes didn't frighten Domm; he had seen that emotion a thousand times, and the candy-cane brace didn't make it any scarier. No, the pistol in his hand got Domm's attention. Ethys hesitated before firing just long enough for Domm to turn and throw himself to the side. The sound and projectile were all wrong, though; Domm dimly recognized that it was only a pellet gun. Then why did Ethys…? The answer became clear when Domm slammed hard into the dart display and stabbed himself in the arm and side with a few of the accursed toy projectiles. "Those are poisoned," Ethys chuckled as he scrambled out of sight again. "Scratch any itches you have, because seconds from now you'll be paralyzed!"

"SHIT!" Domm fired a few bullets through the shelves, hoping to hit his retreating foe, but it was useless. The aisles were made of strong stuff, and he could already feel his arm going numb. Domm stored the rifle inside his PAK while he had the chance, mentally programming the wonder of Irken bionics to redirect all power from his upper and lower body to his PAK-enhanced immune system – he wouldn't be able to use them anyway until he had flushed the poison. Instantly the Defective merc collapsed forward, his spider legs shooting out to fold him softly down onto his knees. He'd still be able to use the metal appendages, but even they'd be clumsier, since he wouldn't be able to move his own weight with them.

Domm soon found he couldn't move the biological components of his body. He couldn't even lift his head; he needed one of his spider legs to hold it up for him, and even then he could barely focus his eyes to see. He supported his body with the other three main legs, and the two scythe-tipped ones he held in front of himself like a preying mantis's front limbs. Carefully, he turned himself around, checking if Ethys was planning on sneaking up behind him, then turned back.

It was a testament to Ethys's caution how long he waited before showing up. Every second Domm didn't know where the scientist was located was exquisite mental agony, even though it was also a second closer to the toxin wearing off. When Ethys finally appeared, he had that flail filled with shrapnel again, along with a survival knife from a few aisles down. "The poison seems to be working," Ethys said. His voice was quiet and cold… he was observing a scientific process aloud, not talking to Domm. Not that Domm could reply if he wanted to… even moving his tongue was beyond the bounty hunter's grasp. "Time to end this." There was no air of finality or special emphasis to this announcement. It was simply a statement, as if 'time to end this' was on Ethys' wristwatch between two o'clock and two-thirty. However, there was plenty of emphasis on the flail swinging down towards Domm. Carefully, Domm deflected it with one of his bladed spider-legs and charged forward, slashing at Ethys in a counterattack. As he feared, though, his uncontrolled body weight threw off his momentum and the attack was overextended and clumsy. Ethys darted to the side (not impaling himself on anything, Domm noticed; he had likely put the darts in position in addition to poisoning the tips), and drew a shallow but long slash down Domm's arm with the tip of the survival knife.

"Wait, that gives me an idea," Ethys spoke suddenly, taking long, jumping strides back and away from Domm and into the aisle he had just left. Dropping the flail's wire momentarily, Ethys produced a glass vial from his PAK and uncorked it with his thumb, holding it gingerly. As Domm steeled himself for another attack, Ethys poured a few drops of sickly red poison from the vial onto his knife. "It kills within minutes of consumption," Ethys noted aloud, putting the vial away with equal care. "I daresay it'll work even faster when absorbed directly into the blood." He made sure the poison had spread along the length of the knife, and took another swing with the flail, forcing Domm to sidestep clumsily.

_There he goes again, talking like I'm not there,_ Domm thought in frustration. Ethys pulled the flail backwards, sidestepped it himself, and slung it back straight forward this time, and so began a long, tense game of cobra versus mongoose. Domm was forced continually on the defensive, unable to move anything but his spider legs, but he had enough of them and was well-trained enough with them to deflect most of Ethys's ranged attacks, and all of his knife attacks. Ethys himself seemed loathe to waste any more resources when his opponent was on the ropes, and neither was he willing to envenom the morningstar. Domm guessed it was because the weapon was so unwieldy; at least twice, he saw Ethys accidentally scratch himself with the side of the thing. Ethys would land a blow every two or three minutes, drawing a little more blood from Domm, but it was doubtful this would add up before Domm regained use of his arms and legs (especially with Domm boosting his immune system, but Ethys didn't know that).

Finally, Ethys'd had enough. His eyes angrily flashed wide, and he stabbed the knife into a barrel of Blasterballs to his right, freeing up a hand to reach back into his orange-red PAK. He grabbed a grey metal grenade with a crosshatched pattern, popped the pin, and threw it with a disturbing grimace. Domm felt cold fear surge through him, because this wasn't a smoke grenade or some such nonsense. This was a **grenade** grenade, probably of the fragmentation variety, and he knew it just from Ethys' body language while he used it. Deciding not to charge Ethys while he had access to that poisonous dagger (of doom), Domm instead turned and ran from the aisle, the grenade bouncing after him.

The grenade burst with a real explosion as expected, but by then Domm had turned into the aisle two down from where he had run, and he was safe from the shrapnel. What he wasn't safe from, though, running unsteadily on spider legs at full speed, was a tripwire stretched taut across the aisle. Domm crashed facefirst to the floor, and he felt the vibrations from sprinting footsteps as Ethys rushed to find him. He'd reach Domm in a moment, possibly before the paralyzed soldier could untangle himself and get his face off the ground to see what was going on. Accordingly, Domm began slashing wildly with the blades on his spider legs, trying to sever all the wires he could without cutting part of himself. Thrashing about, he felt something roll out of his pants pocket, and a swinging spiderleg knocked it into the air. _One of Zor's orbs!_ The orb bounced off a shelf, off a box advertising the cure to Athlete's Tentacle, and into Domm's mouth, which he belatedly realized had been hanging slack since he was paralyzed. The thrashing became even more frenetic, Domm trying not to choke on the damn marble while unable to move most of the muscles in his throat, and he ended up swallowing it.

Finally, the wires came loose, and Domm flopped down as his limbs were freed. He lay on his side, tilted slightly back, with his head tilted up towards the darkened lights of the superstore. "Are you finished?" Ethys wasn't in his field of vision, but judging from the volume and direction of his voice, he was above Domm (relative to the current position of his head), probably a few feet out of the range of his recently thrashing spider legs. He didn't wait for an answer before another grenade bounced along the ground, rolling to a stop just past Domm's arm. Domm had time enough to do two things: clench his eyes shut under his goggles, and realize that the poison had faded enough that he could clench his eyes shut. Well, that and wish real hard.

---

"DOMM!" Erris cried as another blast engulfed the aisle. Emotionless and unflinching, the robotic camera drone steadily recorded the pieces of refuse that flew through the air, burnt and smashed beyond recognition. The signal sent out through the camera drone was beamed up to one of a series of satellites, which beamed it in turn to the major Irken television stations. To most of the Empire, it would show hours or even days later. To anybody who got Pay-per-view, such as every television screen on the Massive, the action was more instant thanks to the miracle of faster-than-light data.

Irken television was notoriously difficult to jack, but Erris was an expert hacker. She didn't need their Pay-per-view, she was in orbit around the Blood-Sport planet and could hack it before it even got to the stations. As long as their ship didn't try to dip lower than the military blockade, nobody bothered them (except each other, of course). "No, Big Boy!" Edh wailed. "I didn't even get to shack up with you yet!"

"Ugh, will you two shut up?!" Lio grunted, watching Xix hungrily stalk a heavily armed Raf on an entirely different part of the planet. "Domm's fine." He pointed a meaty, armor-plated hand at another display on the windshield, hanging above their heads. "His life-support data's strong."

"You're right…" Erris noticed with a frown. "What happened, then?" she gazed back to the screen, where a muttering Ethys was looking for Domm. Ethys was no expert on the subject, and bodies made him squeamish, but even he knew there should have been something left of his latest foe.

"C'mon, Xixxy… Lio's got a lot ridin' on ya…"

"Did you… are you betting on a contestant that isn't Domm?" Erris asked incredulously.

"No," Lio lied smoothly. "I bet that Xix would make it to the final round _against_ boss. Nuthin' wrong with that, right?"

---

Domm opened his eyes.

He was outside. He was propped against something hard and metallic, his back to it. He was still paralyzed. And he had no idea how he had gotten there. To start with, he attempted to move on his own. It was no good. He needed to force so much willpower into each action, and could only yet perform the tiniest movements. He could twitch his lips, yes, but he couldn't shut his mouth, let alone lift his head. He briefly considered trying to wiggle his big toe, but decided instead he'd be better off determining his location.

Re-engaging his spider legs (which had retracted somewhere between the grenade and opening his eyes), he pulled himself up into the air and forced his eyes to focus, still holding his head up with one mechanical limb. He was right outside the sports superstore, in the parking lot. In fact, he had been sitting propped against Ethys' nacho rocket, facing the open front door of the sports equipment store (which was handy, as he could keep an eye out for Ethys). Domm settled back down, although he kept his head propped up as he continued testing his weakened body. It was kind of peaceful, actually… for the first few minutes, and then he could hear shouting and an explosion off in a different direction. At least by now he could speak a little and hold his own head up. The other battle was clearly drawing closer, and if he stayed longer out in the open, he'd risk getting caught in the melee. _Between the Trap Booby in there, and two of those other eight Irkens who can make all those loud blast noises, I'm going to face Ethys._

Domm's spider legs carried him carefully through the front entrance… and a grey sphere with a cross-shaped seam bounced along the ground in front of him. Cursing, he turned and ran in another direction just before the bomb set off. It was a flash grenade – something very effective against a sensitive-eyed person like Domm. Even though he had turned away, just a shadow of the flash from all the reflective surfaces still in his field of vision was enough to temporarily fuzz up his vision, polka-dotting it with burning black spots. So concentrated was the stunned Domm in getting out of there that he didn't notice Ethys' hiding place until it was too late.

The flail came down with a glancing blow to the back of his head, stunning Domm for a second. Crashing down after it was Ethys himself, who seemed to have been hiding in the rafters. The scientist landed with his shins on Domm's PAK legs, pinning down the first joints and crashing Domm facefirst to the ground. "I knew you'd come back," Ethys snarled, and there was some definite mania in his voice. "You started the fight, you were going to finish it. I just thought you'd wait until you could move again." Domm's spider legs reversed direction to all point threateningly at Ethys, but he didn't back down. "Don't bother. I've got my poisoned KNIFE to your neck, and I have a few questions for you. First – " he was interrupted by a fresh shouting match, louder than ever. "I'm sure they'll stop in a minute," he finished lamely, but now they were close enough to distinguish words.

"Your arro…" Another explosion. "..don't understand that this is deeper than you, this is –"

"No, YOU don't understand that this is deeper than YOU! This is about Logicals and the fabric of –"

"Your precious Logic shall not save you from my judgment!" Another blast.

"Judgment this, damnation that, do you _ever_ talk like a normal person?!" This time the sound was more of a crack, and it was quickly followed by the sound of a dusty window shattering. Domm turned his head so that his face was less intimate with the concrete and saw a short, black-cloaked Irken had been hurled through the window. The next thing he saw was said Irken slamming into Ethys' thin and rather frail frame (knocking him away), bouncing off the tortured scientist, and gruesomely impaling himself on a rack of fishing rods. "Well, that was rather anticlimactic…" The speaker had not been the Irken currently acquainted with the bait-and-tackle aisle, so Domm turned his head again (noticing it was becoming easier to do so) to see who it had been.

This Irken had bright blue eyes and had used his spider legs to pull himself through the frame of the broken window. His white lab coat, much longer than Ethys', flapped in the breeze, and there was some sort of rippling, colorful distortion framing him, waving behind him and curling along his PAK's appendages. "Who… who the hell are you two freaks?!" Ethys shrieked, pulling himself off the floor with all the ease and grace of an orb-weaver spider that had been fed tainted LSD. Domm, however, knew who they were before they introduced themselves. Niz and…

"Dire," the blue-eyed Irken crisply replied. "I was just dealing with our pesky Magical friend here, and I'd appreciate if you two would wait your turn to - urgh!" A few fishing rods flew past him like javelins; a stray hook from one of them had dragged along the side of his head, leaving a nasty trail of dripping green blood. He was so surprised that he stumbled off the ledge and fell into the store proper.

Niz had gotten to his feet and angrily thrown the javelins, raw malice radiating out from his eyes. They were every bit as unnerving as Dire's, reminding Domm unpleasantly of Jack-o-Lanterns. The fact that he had four fishing rods through his chest, but appeared to have no difficulty breathing or moving, improved the effect. "I have rendered judgment," he snarled. "You're _guilty_ if I've ever seen it."

**To Be Continued…**

**Couple of points to note:**

**- Domm teleported by accident to avoid the grenade, actually using the power of Zor's orb that he swallowed. I don't plan on ever giving Domm Zor's full black-orb-a-kinesis powers, but it's a handy deus ex machina to have around. I'll try not to abuse it any more than I already have.**

**- Niz and Dire were fighting each other as a completely seperate pair in Round 4, and Dire's author (The Talking Absol) and I had been increasingly giving shout-outs to each other, so we just decided, 'wouldn't it be cool to cross over our fights entirely?' So we did. Domm and Ethys guest-starred in Dire's Round 4, and Niz and Dire guest-star in mine. Niz and Ethys' authors were cool with it, and Niz's author, Irken-Maniac, even used a brief cameo of Domm in his fight as well. This is why the chapter became so obscenely long, btw.**

**Well, next chapter concludes this fight! How will Domm win, with the paralysis toxin still coursing through his veins? Can these two new superpowered Irkens be stopped? Find out... in the next few days, probably within a week!**

**Oh, and visit the forum for my new tournament, A Winner Is Two! A Survivalist Is You. It's just like this Blood-Sport tourney, but with canon characters from any fandom! And you can't enter comics! But it's here on this site - there's a link in my profile - and totally free, with the possibility of prizes! Anyway, if you've read this far, you're likely interested in character tournaments, so give it a look!  
**


	8. Round 4 Part II: Vs Ethys, Dire, Niz

**Part II**

**I do not own Invader Zim, Irkens (owned by Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon), Ethys (owned by Mizucloud), Dire (owned by The Talking Absol), or Niz (Irken-Maniac).** **I own Domm, Erris, Edh, and Lio.**

**I get a bit entangled with the extra baggage of Dire's setting here, but bear with me.  
**

"You're _guilty_ if I've ever seen it."

"Oh, is that a fact?" Dire growled, getting to his feet. A green tendril of light on one of his spider legs seemed to writhe. "Yes, Seruki, I'm going to defeat him," the scientist answered it testily. "I'm going to CRUSH him. The others, too, most likely." A blue tendril on another spider leg twitched in response; did those things have faces?! "Be quiet. I know exactly what I'm doing." He charged forward, running down an aisle towards Niz, Ethys, and Domm (who hadn't gotten up off the floor; he was still weak and had decided to play dead for the moment). "You filthy undead Magical, prepare to… eh?" Dire suddenly tripped and found himself suspended in midair at an odd angle. He threw out his arms desperately, but only succeeded in further entangling himself in what Domm quickly recognized as another, more elaborate set of Ethys' tripwires. "What on Earth is this? String?"

"You look good that way!" Niz called.

"What's Earth?" Ethys mumbled.

_Damned if I know,_ Domm thought to himself.

"Very funny," Dire deadpanned. "Stahrico, zap these away." There was a pause as Dire actually _argued_ with his yellow tendril. "Shut up, I don't care what they're made of! Zap them until they're gone!" The next thing out of Dire's mouth was an agonized scream as he electrocuted himself along with the wires, causing Niz to double over in laughter. Domm managed to keep his laughter silent, and even Ethys chuckled. "Not… string…" Dire finally managed through clenched teeth. "Fine… I'll just pull until they snap!" The tendrils seemed to curl around the blue-eyed Irken's arms and legs, and he began to contract his body, pulling on the wires. First one cord snapped… and then another… and then an entire shelf was pulled over, simply crushing Dire underneath and eliciting a fresh wave of laughter from the others.

"Now…" Niz said, instantly sobering up after a few seconds. "Down to justice."

"Justice?" Ethys asked meekly, stepping back.

Niz advanced as Ethys retreated, seemingly staring right into his soul. "Ethys…" Niz spoke. "You are not naturally a killer, far from it. But since coming here, your mind has fractured. You have killed several already, and you are even beginning to enjoy it. I'm going to kill you." A solid darkness crept out from his hands, forming into an imposing scythe, and the flesh seemed to vanish from his hands, leaving only bleached bone. The effect more than made up for the significant height difference between the two. "I shall kill you, and you will be saved from your own encroaching psychosis."

"But… but…" Ethys was interrupted as Niz leapt forward with frightening speed and swung his new scythe. Ethys quickly leapt away, and the scythe instead sliced through the rack behind him. The blade must have been amazingly sharp, as it cut cleanly through an entire rack of Conquerball flagpoles – and being made of solid titanium, they were quite hard under any circumstances. His eyes wide as those of a deer in headlights, Ethys pulled himself into a mad scramble to put distance between himself and Niz, dropping a pair of smoke bombs as he fled. The Necro-Irken chased his latest quarry into the smoke, and the last Domm saw of him was the flickering, fiery light emanating from the clear portions of his skull-shaped PAK.

Domm ordered his PAK to redistribute his energy, giving himself normal strength in his arms and legs again, but found himself still a bit weak. Groaning from the dull, acidic pain that he still felt throughout his muscles, he drew his shotgun from his PAK, and kept his bladed pair of spider legs at the ready as he stalked diagonally around the smoke cloud, avoiding it and watching for traps. He dodged around a proximity alarm that was hardwired to a frag grenade, but he didn't see the blue eyes balefully staring out at him from under the toppled shelves.

---

Coughing, Niz burst out of the far side of the smoke, only to feel a small, round object covered in small jagged points catch him across the left temple, causing him to cry out and stagger to his right. Reflexively, Ethys pulled the flail back towards himself and to his left, slamming Niz again, on the back of the neck this time. Hollering in pain, the short Irken fell to his knees, his scythe vanished, and Ethys saw his chance. Letting loose something that could generously be called a war cry, the scientist advanced with surprising speed, drew his poisoned dagger, and buried it into Niz's chest, leaving it there. His wide, manic grin returned as Niz stared down at the hilt of the survival knife with one open eye, his left eye clenched shut in pain. Ethys giggled the way a man who has just narrowly avoided being hit by a train would giggle, and kicked the short Irken in the face for good measure. "I got you… I got you GOOD! You're DEAD and you can't attack me anymore!"

"PATHETIC!" Niz suddenly shouted up at Ethys, causing him to flinch and recoil. The undead warrior pulled the gleaming knife from his chest, and tossed it away like so many of Ethys' desperate hopes. "You think this… this mortal weapon can stop me?! I am INDESTRUCTIBLE!" The Shadow Scythe suddenly reappeared, and Niz hurled himself into the air, spinning his body like a rotor and dragging the large black blade along with him. Ethys dove to the ground, but not fast enough – he felt one of his antennae severed near the base, and hit the ground screaming and clutching the stump. Niz landed on his feet and turned, stoically watching Ethys roll on the ground and shriek as blood leaked from his head. A severed antennae wasn't fatal or even really significantly inconvenient, but it was extremely painful at first and considered a bit disfiguring – similar to a mammalian species losing an external ear. "And now… the end!" He raised the scythe, but before he could lower it, he was struck by a burst of plasma.

"You're just a walking cliché, aren't you?" Domm chuckled, the end of his shotgun illuminating his face at a strange angle, making it look haunting. Niz stumbled back but stayed on his feet, his head lolling wildly as he tried to regain his bearings. Domm didn't give him the chance, emptying blast after blast of plasma into the little Irken. On the sixth spray of hot, piercing blue plasma, Niz collapsed against a rack of white socks, his breathing labored. "Had enough?"

"Domm…" Niz wheezed. "You have hundreds, maybe thousands, of untimely deaths that lead back to you. You know in your heart that what you do is wrong, and yet you are utterly unrepentant." His voice was gaining strength, conviction. "Even now, you instinctively stopped me from killing Ethys, but only because you want to do it yourself… you think you'll get more dirty money that way."

"Are you…? You ARE! You're reading my mind!" Domm blasted Niz again, and lashed out with a scythe-tipped spider leg, impaling the smaller Irken and lifting him into the air. "Now you've made me REALLY angry!" He slammed Niz against a high shelf full of Basketbrawl products, but to his surprise, Niz suddenly anchored there and Domm was unable to jerk him free. "The hell?"

"Feel a small sample of the _pain_ you have caused others!" Niz extended an arm, and a tendril of shadow shot out and spiraled down Domm's spider leg. Domm tried to pull free, but he wasn't fast enough, and the solidified darkness wrapped around his neck, attempting to snap it. Domm struggled with the tentacle, clawing at it, shooting it with his shotgun, even biting it, but nothing worked. Niz began to laugh, but then he stopped as something round and metallic bounced off his skull. "What?" Domm recognized it immediately – a flash grenade of Ethys', and he saw the master of traps fleeing while clutching his head. This time, Domm didn't mess around – even as his vision began to go dark from the lack of air, he covered his eyes with his arms and shut them tight.

He felt the light wash over him in a fast-moving wave, and then the tendril around his neck vanished and he was pulled forward by a sudden weight – without warning, Niz had come loose again and was now at Domm's mercy. Domm, however, stumbled, and Niz was able to simply slip off the end of the blade and drop unceremoniously to the ground. "It turned a little bright there for shadowcasting, didn't it?" Domm snapped hoarsely.

"He's only staved off the inevitable," Niz growled, blinking his orange eyes rapidly. "You're still FIRST!" He stretched out a hand in Domm's direction, but nothing happened. "The damn flash must have shorted out my shadows!"

"That's really too bad." Domm blasted him again with the Enigma, but the short Irken braced himself for the impact, and he didn't even take a step back this time. In the majority of a second he had between Domm's blasts, Niz charged low, creeping under most of Domm's shot as he fired from the hip, and tackled the taller Irken. Domm struggled with the short Irken for a time, trying to find room to use his spider legs or shove the gun's barrel into his opponent's face, but no luck. Even temporarily depowered, his opponent was a fierce, tooth-and-nail combatant who shook off even the most ridiculous wound in an instant. When Domm finally did get room to use his guns, he had bigger problems.

---

Gasping for breath, Ethys stumbled around a corner and leaned against it, sinking to the floor. With fumbling claws, he tore a long strip from his already-shredded jacket and wrapped it around his scalp, allowing his remaining antenna to stick out. He shuddered and hissed through his teeth at the pain, pulling a vial from his belt. Those two would have to go down one way or another.

"Hello, what have we here?" Ethys looked up, eyes wide, and found himself staring into another pair of eyes. They were shining light blue, with dark blue slits that terrified him to the core. He had to force himself to blink, and when he looked again, the slits were gone, but the eyes were still there, attached to a brooding Irken of about Domm's height in a white coat.

"I… I don't want any trouble."

"I can respect that," Dire answered, his voice almost soothing. "However, I plan on a whole lot of trouble. A whole universe's worth, actually. My little friends here…" and the colorful tendrils fanned out from behind Dire, waving in the wind like ethereal tails, "…aren't allowing me, but in the meantime they give me some interesting powers that let me have… I suppose most Irkens would say 'some fun'. Do you want to have 'fun'?"

"NO!"

"Wrong answer." Ethys hurriedly threw the blue contents of the vial into his mouth as one of Dire's tails, a blue one, snaked out and wrapped around him, lifting the taller Irken and pulling him up to Dire. "What did you just drink? Some sort of strength serum?" Dire's expression was curious more than anything. "You'll need more than that." Then Ethys spat the paralysis poison in Dire's face, and the shorter Irken began screaming vague obscenities. "What did you just _drink_?! It burns! What's in this stuff?! Agh, I got some in my mouth!" And then Ethys felt the wind rushing past him as Dire tossed him away like a rag doll.

---

"Your shirt is stupid!" Domm yelled as he and Niz rolled around on the floor, grappling.

Niz ended up on top. "Your _goggles_ are stupid!"

"After they made you, they had the spawning tank condemned!" Domm headbutted Niz, but the orange-eyed shadow user held on. "And my goggles are fantastic!"

"After they made _you_, they had the whole damn wing condemned!" Niz lifted an arm, and his hand flickered to bleached bone again as shadows extended from it. "That's the stuff… **ulp!**" Suddenly, a glowing brown tentacle wrapped around Niz's waist, jerked him several feet into the air, and swung him back down with what must have been very close to terminal velocity. Trusting his instincts, Domm rolled clear before Niz could be slammed down onto him, and with good reason: Niz's body left a small crater in the floor. The tentacle, apparently satisfied, tossed its catch into a nearby wall, finally turning to Domm.

"Great. What the hell is _this_ now?!"

The end of the tentacle formed into a monochromatic, serpentine head with a few spines above its face. "You should stop struggling, _now_," it hissed in a feminine voice, gazing at Domm levelly. Domm did what he decided any sensible Irken would do in his situation – he blasted at the tendril with his shotgun. The tentacle dodged, and Domm turned to follow its other end to the source – only to have to dodge a stunned Ethys flying past him at a surprising speed. Ethys smashed into a shelf, which tipped and created a domino effect of toppling merchandise. Ignoring the deafening crash and accompanying dust cloud, Domm blasted at the brown tentacle again, but his buckshot sprayed too widely to fully hit the tendril – at least not at anything but point-blank range – and a partial hit didn't really seem to faze the snakelike thing. "Suit yourself, bastard," it snapped, and it charged at Domm. If Domm hadn't leapt to the side, the sheer physical force of the thing would've driven him into the ground, hard.

Panting, Domm drove both scythe blades into the tendril and pinned it to the ground, where it immediately began thrashing, hissing, and screaming. Domm carefully approached the supernatural thing… and quickly found himself lifted topsy-turvy into the air, his ankle caught in the folds of another, a blue one. A yellow one, crackling with electricity, flew into the air and curled up in front of him, followed by the brown one, which jerked itself free of Domm's now-airborne bladed spider legs. "You're in trouble now," giggled the yellow one in a slightly more masculine voice that reminded Domm of white noise.

It was then that Domm finally spotted the source of the tendrils: Dire. The rogue scientist skittered around a corner, balanced on his four PAK legs – it was painfully obvious that he had received a large dose of the same poison that had paralyzed Domm's muscles earlier. His eyes stared balefully from a face that was otherwise entirely slack. However, his eight 'tails' were writhing around his body, practically cocooning him in protective energy. "Dire had a little 'accident' with your poison-using friend," a 'female' violet tail told Domm as the blue one drew him further in towards Dire. "Now he can't move, but we're doing just fine."

"You wouldn't happen to know what kind of toxin this is, would you?" a pink one asked. It was also feminine, and Domm noticed that all of them spoke through a type of telepathy – their snouts weren't moving. "It's taking me and Serufa like _forever_ to fix."

"Can't say," Domm replied brightly as he figured out what he could do to escape, or kill Dire, or… something. "I got a hit of that stuff – I'd guess it wears off after an hour or so with no other variables to consider. My PAK shook it off in twenty, twenty-five minutes, but I was boosting its power, and it didn't tell me what the poison was. You mind letting me get back to the Blood-Sport?"

"It's only been a couple of minutes, Naruna, so be patient," the (male) blue tail chided. "Serufa, this one's a fighter – he almost severed Hara. Hurry up and eat him."

"Yeah, eat him," the yellow one chimed in. "He's dangerous."

"All right," the violet tail acquiesced. "Hold your horses." She slowly approached Domm, her jaw distending until her mouth had stretched to several times her size – large enough to hold Domm, or just about any other Irken. Domm could feel a weak vacuum sucking him towards the strange creature's mouth, and it terrified him on a primal level; a deep part of his mind that he had left for decades buried and forgotten was screaming as loud as it could that this was a very bad place to go, and Domm decided to trust it.

Since the general consensus was indeed to 'eat him', Domm sprang into action. He extended all six spider legs and jammed them into the blue tail, then pulled up the Enigma and blasted a few rounds into Serufa's maw, earning screams from both of them. The blue tail let go, and Domm flipped to the ground. He made a three-point landing with his shotgun readied in his free hand, but was immediately sideswiped by Hara, the brown tail. The mercenary bounced and rolled along the ground, his shotgun sliding away. Stumbling, Domm got to his feet and jumped straight up, avoiding another wide swing of Hara's body. Barehanded, he turned and rushed Dire himself, rolling left and right to avoid the sparking tackle of the yellow tail and an arcing blast of energy the green one shot from his mouth, two paces from arm's reach of the paralyzed Irken – but then a black tail he hadn't noticed lashed out and quickly constricted around Domm's abdomen in mid-dodge. "What have we here? Can't have you attacking like that, little Irken," the black tail chuckled darkly in a hissing, very male voice. He squeezed until Domm went limp and his vision briefly went white. "That'sss better. Maybe Dire'ssss right… maybe we ssshould finisssh you off."

_**Obliterates the bodies from existence…**_

"No bodies… it's because you guys have just been eating whoever Dire fought," Domm guessed, putting two and two together.

"That's right," Serufa said from behind Domm, and the black tail turned him so he could see her. She was dripping dark green blood from her lips – Domm hadn't seen the tails bleed before, and he realized with a start it was Irken blood. "They were kept safe inside my being – until you shot up my innards. Nora may not survive! How do you feel about that?!"

"Bad, maybe… did she have a bounty?" Domm asked hopefully.

"Murdoch, snap him like a twig," Hara suggested.

"With pleassssure," the dark tail responded. In desperation, Domm activated his power, hoping his disruption would have a harmful effect on Dire's strange creatures. In fact, the result was quite the opposite. "What are you doing? It ticklesss… actually, that feelsss good…" Murdoch relaxed only slightly, but it was enough leverage for Domm to force his PAK legs out again, hacking nearly through the black tail's body. "RARGH! You'll payyy forrrr thaaat…" but Domm was already free, and grabbed Dire's collar with his still-glowing hand, reaching back to draw his chainsaw with the other.

This time, Domm was even more surprised by the result. Dire leapt back with a silent, open-mouthed scream, shying away from the static glow emanating from Domm's fingers as if it were the greatest evil in the universe. In fact, Dire's skin underneath the collar had begun to visibly blister and turn white, appearing to have been burned at extremely high temperatures. "What the hell?!" Domm was so surprised by the result that he jumped away himself and stopped the flow of his power.

"Hang on! Regroup!" Naruna called, and the tails pulled back, coiling protectively in front of the helpless Dire. "…What was that? No, seriously?"

"Me?" Domm asked. "I dunno. I've been able to do that since birth. They say it's part of my Defect, but it doesn't really seem connected to my eyes. It messes with technology, and apparently, that guy." He pointed at Dire. "Is he a robot?"

"No…" Serufa said quietly. The tails began whispering between each other, but Domm picked up parts of it.

"…IS that?"

"Must be…"

"… are the chances?"

"Pretty good, actually, because…"

"…Didn't know we had left any in the Irken race…"

"…just our luck, running up against…"

Waiting for them to make a move, Domm took a fresh look at his surroundings. Most of the cover had been destroyed or knocked over by Dire and these… these things of his. Ethys was still lying where he had been thrown, groaning. Niz was nowhere to be seen, which was probably a bad thing. Suddenly, Murdoch called him back to attention. "Lisssten up, Irken."

"Yes?" Domm considered drawing his chainsaw, but settled for leaving the storage slot open and ready on his PAK.

"Your ability serves a deeper purpose," Naruna explained. "It's a potent form of antilogic, granted to a select group to battle Logicals like Dire if they should ever rise again. It affects machinery, because like Logicals, they operate on a strict set of rules. Your ability actively seeks out strict sets of rules and creates exceptions that don't rationally belong. This power of yours is not unique in the universe, but it is likely unique among Irkens. Do you understand?"

"No, not at all," Domm said politely. "Are you going to attack me again?"

"Not if it can be avoided," Serufa decided. Then she turned to Dire. "Oh, don't look at us like that. Do you think we're the _only_ thing keeping you from changing the universe? Give us more credit than that. We did this for a bunch of Magicals… yeah, we keep at least a dozen in the universe at all times."

Domm was about to ask what a Magical was, but he instead opted to yell, "WATCH OUT!" But it was too late – a shadow tentacle wrapped around Dire's neck and yanked him into the air, tails, spider legs, and all.

"We've had enough of you!" Niz yelled, slamming Dire down onto the same crater where Dire had done the same to him moments earlier. Niz's expression and posture were different now, more actively sinister and unhinged; his voice echoed eerily, and his eyes had turned from lustrous orange to inky black. Not satisfied with driving Dire into the ground, he lifted and smashed the Irken downward again, and this time the floor collapsed, dropping Dire and several hundred pounds of metal-and-concrete building foundation into the darkness below. Niz next turned his attention to Domm, and leapt for him, screaming "SOUL OF THE NIGHT!" in his new, creepy double-voice.

"The feeling's mutual, bastard!" Hara yelled as she and Murdoch shot up from the gaping hole in the ground and fastened around Niz's ankles, pulling him down on his elbows. Niz formed his Shadow Scythe and dug it into the ground, but he only succeeded in gouging a groove in the concrete as the tails pulled him after Dire into the pit, which Domm guessed from the sound of rushing water was a sewer.

"Huh…" Domm looked into the pit. The sewer was roughly tubular, about twelve feet in diameter, with a central alleyway for running water and a walkway on each side. The part directly below him was mostly clogged with rubble; the dust hadn't even settled yet. It smelled awful, and the three feet or so of water didn't look clean even before it reached the crushed cement and Irk-knows-what-else. Niz and Dire were out of sight, but Domm could hear them still fighting a short distance downstream. "Nasty," Domm concluded.

Then he ducked under a small black tear gas bomb, which flew into the sewer instead and promptly detonated, causing the tunnel to smell even worse. "You're still on your feet," Domm noticed as he turned to Ethys. "That's impressive. Maybe you would've made a good soldier after all."

"That's enough out of you!" Ethys screamed in a ragged, overstressed voice. "You're just like the rest of them! Every one of you, laughing at me, belittling me! Because I'm not a soldier, because I don't belong here, you act like you're better than me!" His eyes were tearing as he began to spin his improvised flail at his side. "Well, I have news for you, you bastard! They're all DEAD! One after another, they underestimated me and now they're dead! And you're _next!_" And with that, he swung his weapon.

Domm darted to the side, distancing himself from both the weapon's dangerous weighted end and the pit as he drew his chainsaw. He tried to close on Ethys, but the Irken scientist disappeared in a smoke cloud. Domm jumped back, avoiding the smoke barrier, and looked for where Ethys could have run off to. That's when the flail erupted from the smoke – the scientist had faked him out by staying in place inside the cloud. With no time to parry, Domm could only block the improvised weapon with his humming saw… and he instantly regretted it. The pouch bounced off the teeth of the Grimm at an angle, but one side was caught in the weapon and shredded, spraying Domm with shrapnel. Screaming in pain as tiny particulate tore open the left side of his face, Domm jumped back – had he not been wearing goggles, he would have lost his eye as well.

Ethys swung the flail in a wide arc around the dissipating smoke cloud – the end was leaking broken glass and shoelace bits now, and he couldn't hold it near him without risking serious injury. As it completed its arc, it swung back towards Domm, but the merc was ready now. He jumped inside its maximum range and severed the weapon along its cord, leaving Ethys with nothing but a length of wire – and that wouldn't stand up to a chainsaw. Panicking, Ethys threw a double handful of random grenades in Domm's general direction and ran the other way, wondering where Niz had dropped that knife.

"Is that the best you've got?" Domm evaded all the grenades, simply running and passing them by before any of the dangerous ones' timers had activated. Ethys noticed and ran faster, but Domm pulled another of Zor's orbs from his pocket with his free hand and threw it past the scientist. Ethys stopped dead in his tracks, not wanting to run towards what he apparently believed to be a grenade (and with all the kinds he used, could you blame him?). Before he'd found a new direction to flee in, Domm had gotten close to fully extend three of his spider legs and attack with them. Ethys dodged the initial thrust with the two scythe-tipped legs, but the third hit him in mid-sidestep and slashed a shallow wound above his right hip.

Ethys winced and grabbed the wound, which was burning strangely. He noticed a smear of something yellow-orange on the end of Domm's spider leg. "What's that? What'd you do?!" Ethys yelled hoarsely.

"I gave you a taste of your own medicine," Domm replied. He began to smile, but swore and gritted his teeth instead – he couldn't change his expression without tearing up the side of his face even more. "Or should I say, a taste of your own nachos?" he managed to finish. "I knew you poisoned them with something."

Ethys paled. "It's a fast-action memory-loss drug…"

"Well, it's nothing you weren't willing to use on me, so I'd say you deserve it."

Ethys ran off, shaking like a leaf. He dropped yet another steam grenade behind him, but Domm didn't even bother to give chase.

"This time, the 'just desserts' line is probably a better fit," Domm chuckled (then winced again), "but who would eat nachos for dessert?" He stooped to pick up the black 'marble' he had thrown, which had rolled back to stop at his feet.

_"Are you just going to let him run?"_

"Hey, Erris." Domm fished through his PAK for a pair of tweezers, found none, and resorted to picking bits of glass out of his face with his claws, stifling a yelp each time. "He won't get far. He won't even know who he is in a few minutes."

_"Good point. Hey, what happened earlier? We lost visual and auditory with you just after that Niz guy crashed through the window. We just got it back half a minute ago."_

"Oh, really? You missed the best part! It was probably Dire. He's got crazy shit going on with him I can't even - _nggh!_ - begin to explain… I'd say it's a safe bet he disrupts communications equipment when he's in fight mode."

_How does he manage that?_

"Well, he…" a silver gun turret suddenly unfolded from the ceiling and focused on Domm, its twin barrels and camera lens cold and imposing as it began to whine. "I'll have to call you back, Erris."

"DIE IRKEN SCUM. THAT IS ALL."

---

Gasping, the tall, wounded Irken scrambled into the small room and closed the door behind him. His PAK told him his name was Ethys and that he was a scientist, and that seemed right… but it also told him he was on an abandoned planet, being forced to fight for his life to amuse others, and that he had already killed three other Irkens. It even told him he was starting to enjoy it! His PAK must be faulty… yeah, that was it, it must be faulty. The Irken sniffled, shuddered at the pain of his wounds (where had they all come from?), and collapsed into a chair, sobbing.

He couldn't hide here for long – that Irken with the goggles might still be chasing him! He took a look around for an escape route. No good – it was a small manager's office, and the only window (once he peeled back the blinds to take a look) let back out into the store. He hastily locked and barricaded the door, which he had reached at the end of a short flight of stairs, with his chair and the desk. What else could he push in front of the door? There was a filing cabinet, a personal computer that had been under the desk, a set of security monitors, a perimeter defense system, and a wall full of Employee of the Month pictures. Sighing, he resigned himself to grabbing the cabinet and – perimeter defense?

He ran over to check the machine out, leaving the cabinet to topple and crash to the floor. It had a lot of controls he wasn't familiar with, but the large switch from "OFF" to "AUTO" (printed in Standard) was easy enough. He flicked it on, and watched the large device boot up.

Poor Ethys. He had no way of knowing the extent to which this planet had attempted to militarize in defense against the Irken Empire's assault. He had no way of knowing that this device had been installed specifically to target hostile Irkens – it had never been needed before, because the civilization had such a low crime rate. He had no way of knowing that one of the laser turrets it activated was right there in the office, and that they automatically targeted his species. No way, at least, until the turret droned, "DIE IRKEN SCUM. THAT IS ALL," and shot him.

---

"YARGH!" Domm swung his saw, slicing through another turret like a knife through butter. That was the last of them… at least in this part of the building. The turrets were powerful, but the aiming mechanism was slow, and they had dust in their camera lenses – besides, an automated defense system was no match for a true warrior with a good weapon. Domm had been able to destroy them with only moderate effort while tracking Ethys (who had unknowingly left a trail of blood from the wound on his side). Finally, he came to a locked door; short on patience, he simply cut it off its hinges and pushed it in with his spider legs. He had to push in a desk and a chair that Ethys had slid in front of the door as well, but planting his feet and giving it another hearty shove gave Domm room to sneak in.

"DIE IRKEN SCUM. THAT IS ALL." Another turret swiveled to face him, and Domm rolled to dodge a few powerful flashes of concentrated light. Spotting a control panel, Domm slapped his hand on it as the ceiling-mounted gun methodically turned to face him. It never reached him, as a burst of Domm's chromatic power scrambled the defense system long enough for him to locate an outlet and unplug it. Afterwards, Domm chopped the panel, then the turret, in half for good measure.

"Now, where's that scientist?" Domm didn't have to look long. There was an even thicker trail of blood leading behind the overturned filing cabinet, and judging by the blackened, half-melted spots on its metal surface, the turret had taken a few shots at it. Domm stepped over the cabinet and found Ethys, and he was in a bad way. The first shot had destroyed most of the upper half of Ethys' orange PAK, and the second had struck him full in the chest, burning deep into his squeedlyspooch. He was still conscious, but he wouldn't last five more minutes. "Hello there."

"You…" Ethys wheezed. "My PAK says – said – that I'm a murderer, that I killed people and I enjoyed it. That's not true, is it? That's not who I am… is it?" He was pleading more than asking.

Domm blinked back his pity. "No, Ethys, it isn't." He brought up his chainsaw.

Ethys closed his eyes. "Good… I'm glad…" When Domm decapitated him, his expression was calm – he looked healthier than he had all night. Domm even felt bad for a few seconds before rifling through Ethys' clothing and what was left of his PAK for weapons or other useful tools.

_"Good work on those turrets,"_ Erris congratulated. _"Your camera drone got destroyed by one, but they're having Ethys' old drone follow you around now."_ Domm eyed the omnipresent droid and saw that this one had a different serial number printed on it. Otherwise, it was exactly the same. _"So what's your next move? Hunker down and heal again?"_

"Not exactly…" Domm sat on the burnt cabinet and fished out his bandages. As soon as he had finished dressing his wounds, he'd be following the other two down that sewer. "I need to see how deep the rabbit hole goes."

**End of Round 4**

**If Dire's parts didn't make sense to you, I can't entirely blame you. It's an intricate and complicated story, but you can find out more about it in The Talking Absol's fic _There's Always a Light in the Darkness_, found both here and on deviantART. The best I can describe is that Dire's 8 tails, each of which are sentient, lend him extraordinary power but also seal Dire's even-scarier Logical powers away, while simultaneously forbidding him to kill. Niz is a bit simpler in that he's an undead regenerating Irken with shadow powers, destined to someday become the Grim Reaper of Irkens. Ethys, of course, is just a nervous scientist with a talent for laying traps and creating toxins. I've yet to finish Round 5, but after I do, I'll edit it for this site.**

**Again, don't forget to look into my fanfiction tournament if you enjoy fanfiction fight sequences. Try to defeat all the other contestants and win a prize!  
**


	9. Round 5 Part I: Vs Niz and Silver

**Here's the (much-belated) first part of my Round 5 entry. I've actually gotten as far as Round 6 already - the finals - and I'm waiting for judgment on whether I've won the tournament or not. *Fingers crossed* Anyway, these were the semifinals - and there were five contestants left, an issue which was solved by three of us being placed in a three-person free-for-all. Irken-Maniac, one of my opponents, submitted another written entry (also two parts), and The Darkest Prince submitted a 25-page color comic. Both were great, and you should check those two out if you're an IZ fan on deviantART. You may remember Irken-Maniac's character Niz guest-starring with his Round 4 opponent Dire in my last entry. Niz beat Dire (in a close and epic match), so he's the one left alive here.**

**Oh, and this chapter title is crap. Please excuse it.  
**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Invader Zim or Irkens, Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon do. Irken-Maniac owns Niz, The Talking Absol owns (mentioned) Dire, and The Darkest Prince owns Silver.  
**

**Blood-Sport Round 5:**

**Between Black and Silver**

"Damn, it's dark in here…" Domm looked around. The alien race had either neglected to put lighting in their sewers, or the lights simply didn't work, which seemed unlikely, considering that the city's electricity functioned just fine. Sighing, Domm pulled up his goggles and took a look around, blinking as he adjusted to using his eyes without a light filter for the first time in a long time. Snow white, they shone like nothing else, even in the near total darkness of the sewers. Now it was easy for him to see the fight's aftermath – the sewer led off in two directions, but only one was spotted with thick, congealed blood and great gouges torn in the concrete.

It wasn't long before Domm ran into one of his targets. Niz sat in the darkness of the sewer, clutching a long burn on his arm that Domm guessed was from sewer water. Niz's skin was blue-grey and decomposed-looking, but it reacted to the wound much as living tissue would; it was healing faster, though. The short, orange-eyed Irken's black cloak lay soaked and empty some distance away, revealing the black-and-grey striped shirt he wore; both were tattered from the various abuses Niz had taken throughout Blood-Sport. Domm could even identify the closely grouped circular holes from his shotgun blasts. Slowly, the Necro-Irken raised his claws to the black mask on his forehead, making sure it was secure, before he stood and matched Domm's gaze. "He's gone," Niz said hoarsely.

"Dire? I can't blame you for killing the guy." Inside his head, Domm's mind was a whirl of thoughts, mostly centering on how to kill this new threat. Perhaps dismemberment would do the trick.

"I didn't kill him," Niz corrected, shaking his head. "I finally beat the bastard and all those crazy dragons of his into submission. And then the red-and-gold one asked him to stop… blue-eyes wanted to keep going, but without his dragons helping him, he was laughably weak. It wasn't even fun anymore. Finally, one of them teleported him out of here, kicking and screaming. He should have been grateful… most of the people who lose around here don't get to live on." Niz shook out his cloak, then began to put it on, despite the dull sizzling sound it made on contact with him. "Something about him made me extremely angry… at first I was angry I didn't get to finish him off, but now that I think about it, I'm just glad he's gone." The orange-eyed Irken's cloak suddenly billowed, as if a gust of wind had passed by, and Domm got the sense that it had spontaneously dried off. "You want to fight me, right? Let's get on with it."

"One question, first…" _How do I kill you?_ "What are you, really?"

Niz smiled mysteriously. "I am what I am, and that's all I ever will be." With that, he ran towards Domm. Domm sidestepped a swing of Niz's claws and backhanded the shorter Irken, causing him to stumble and slip on the damp sewer walkway. Domm followed up with a kick that knocked Niz to the edge of the walkway, but he kicked off and managed to leap the distance over the sewer water, grabbing the opposite platform by his elbows and hauling himself up. "Shadow Tentacles!" Several long, black tendrils extended from the ground below Niz and stretched over the cold, murky water, lashing at Domm.

Domm cursed and extended his spider legs, beating back the tentacles as he considered what weapon would be effective against them. However, he didn't notice the fourth tentacle forming from the shadows behind him until it coiled around his chest and pulled him up against the wall, pinning his spider legs at awkward angles. "Fuuuuck…" Domm wheezed as it squeezed him.

With a wave, Niz banished the other tentacles and powered himself back across the sewer with another leap. "Curious… I expected more of a challenge. I won't kill you if you're willing to surrender."

"Surrender?" Domm chuckled breathlessly. "I have you… right where I want you…" Niz was too busy searching Domm's expression to notice, but Domm was pulling off one boot by pressing his other heel to its toe.

"Really?" Niz clenched his teeth and leaned further in; even with the goggles up, Domm's expression was hard to read.

"Definitely." Domm swung his foot up and around, activating his power as he kicked at Niz's PAK. The spectral energy jolted into Niz's specialized SkullPAK, and Domm squeezed his eyes shut at the resulting lightshow. Niz screamed, his orange eyes and the glow from his PAK both flickering. A light blue wisp of something burst from Niz's PAK and spiraled down the sewer tunnel, wailing in a tone that made Domm want to rip his antennae out. Echoing down the tunnel and mixing with Niz's shriek, the effect chilled him to the bone.

The tendril dropped Domm, and he quickly pulled his boot back on, the damp stone painful against the sensitive skin of his bare foot. Still on the ground, he whipped a spider leg out and knocked the stunned Necro-Irken on his back. "What… what are _you_?" Niz gasped, as Domm used the mechanical limbs to pull himself to his feet. "Really?"

"I am what I am," Domm responded with a grin, "but I've changed before." Shoving his goggles back down, he pulled out the first weapon he grabbed in his PAK – Vex's rifle – and levelled it at Niz's face.

"Damn you!" Niz jumped to his feet, ignoring the bullet Domm managed to put in his shoulder, and pushed the mercenary away. "Shadow Tentacles!" The tentacles appeared again, this time from the sleeves of Niz's cloak, and extended towards Domm. He jumped back, but one grabbed his wrist. Using his free hand, Domm quickly put the rifle back in his PAK before Niz yanked Domm forward. The other tentacles grabbed Domm's remaining arm and legs, spread-eagling him, but Domm's bladed spider legs extended and dug into one of Niz's forearms. The tentacles on that side dissolved, and Domm pulled his shotgun from his PAK with his freed hand.

_I have to get us out of this sewer,_ Domm thought as Niz yanked Domm up to melee range by his right arm and leg. _With my goggles on, I can't see those black tentacles in this darkness, and with my bare eyes, I can't use any of my guns or Ethys' grenades for the light they create. _Badly off-balance, Domm was nevertheless able to blast Niz with the shotgun at this range, and the combination of knockback and recoil tore him free from the other dark tendrils.

"Shadow Scythe," Niz coughed, and the flesh and bones vanished from his hands, leaving them skeletal as the black scythe appeared clutched in his claws. "Now, die swiftly!" he swung the scythe, barely missing Domm's neck. Domm stepped back and blasted Niz again, but Niz just gritted his teeth and swung again.

Domm jumped back, but the blade still drew a bit of blood from the side of his chin. _Is the blade getting longer as he swings? No, it must be my imagination._ Domm waited for Niz to overextend on one of his slashes, and when he did, Domm charged in and blasted Niz in the stomach with his shotgun. Niz barely staggered, but Domm took the opportunity to grab one of Ethys' crosshatched grenades from his PAK, activate it, and shove it into the large wound left in Niz's abdomen.

"SHIT!" Niz scrambled at his stomach as Domm's spider legs extended and he rapidly skittered backwards. "Shadow Tentacles!" He dissipated the scythe, and instead darkness bubbled over the grenade and his entire abdomen. After a second, a tentacle tipped in a bulb launched outward and upward from Niz's torso, desperately trying to get some distance between him and the grenade…

---

A tall, grey-eyed Irken stood in the predawn darkness, surveying the concrete jungle around him. A stiff wind tore through the alleyways and whipped his long, slicked-back antennae to one side. His only protection from the elements (aside from his PAK, of course) was a silvery shirt, white pants held up with a dark grey belt, and long black gloves and boots. A dark grey breastplate, equipped with silver shoulder pads and collar, protected him from everything else. His stern countenance was in marked contrast to the easygoing expression he'd first landed on the planet with; even dust would run and hide from this face.

His name was Takahiro, although most only knew of him as General Silver. His smooth attitude, great skill, and general physique (with his top-percentile height, sculptured body, and lack of physical defects aside from a highly unusual eye color, he was the model of Irken physical perfection) had increased his followers exponentially with every round he emerged the victor from. And yet, he regretted coming. The sight of the very best that the Irken species had to offer killing each other off for petty amusement sickened him, but the visceral horror of _having to do it himself…_ it was downright traumatizing, to say the least. When he became champion (and he would, because that was simply all there was to it), he would see to it that the Irken Empire was moved to more capable hands – under Red and Purple's reign, it would clearly self-destruct within the century.

A digital screen unfolded from his PAK and exposed itself to him. _"Congratulations on reaching the final five,"_ the text read. _"Your next possible opponents are both at coordinates Plural Z Alpha-7439, Zone Beta. Domm the Freelance Mercenary - __known Defective__. Niz the Necromancer –status error 24666 – please clarify: is Irken Niz alive or dead?"_

Silver ignored the enigmatic status error – he'd seen more like that since joining Blood-Sport than in the entire rest of his life. It was more the 'both at the same coordinates' part that concerned him. He brought up a digital map of the planet on the same screen. "Plural Z Alpha-7439? That's practically right in front of me. Can't be more than sixty meters away…" he began searching, but they weren't in sight, and he couldn't hear anything inside of the buildings. Using a pair of his PAK legs, he stripped through the boards of a restaurant of mixed culture and cuisine. "Nothing?"

_"Be advised – possible targets have already engaged with each other. Three-person combat is likely."_

"If they're already fighting, there should be an uproar… where the hell are they?!" A moment later, the ground twenty paces to Silver's right exploded, and he got his answer.

---

Domm leapt through the smoke and into fresh, cold air, distancing himself from Niz. He wasn't sure if the Necro-Irken was stunned, but even if he was, it would be hard to take advantage of. Better to distance himself now. Domm swept his gaze along the sky – there were no stars; the planet's atmosphere was still hazy from the Irken Invasion and its aftermath. Judging by the brightness of said haze and the position of the planet's moons, the sun would be up fairly soon, and that would be bad for Domm but hopefully worse for Niz. Niz's umbrakinesis was empowered by darkness… how much light would Domm need to disable it?

"You must be Domm," a voice said, and Domm turned to find General Silver staring at him with a critical eye, no more than eight meters from him.

"Uh… yeah." _Holy shit, but he's tall! He must be a good two heads taller than me, at least. Alright, calm down, Domm. The bigger they are… but then again, discretion is the better part of valor. _"I'm kinda busy with a fight already right now… perhaps we could duel later?" His chest hurt with every deep breath; a large bruise was probably forming, but Domm shrugged it off.

"Better idea." Two metal tentacles, tapering to a whip-like point, extended from Silver's PAK. "I'll take you both on, if your friend isn't dead from that explosion."

Domm extended his blade-tipped spider legs, rubbing his chin one last time. His claw came back clean; his PAK was operating at full efficiency to deal with his wounds. "Who am I to refuse a battle?" Domm stabbed one spider leg forward experimentally, leaping forward far enough for the blade to reach Silver.

Silver dodged the attack with ease, one of his PAK tentacles reaching out to entangle Domm's spider leg. "Would you refuse a date?" he asked coyly.

Domm was briefly frighteningly reminded of Edh, only with actual suavity, and decided he didn't like how either the battle or the conversation was going. He swung in with his other spider leg, but Silver's other tentacle wrapped around it and, with surprising strength, yanked it completely off-course. "Let's keep it professional," Domm snapped, trying to pull free.

"Of course," Silver crooned, two more tentacles extending. These were tipped with sharp, curved gadgets that bore a resemblance, possibly intentional, to scorpion tails. "Back to killing you." With a single yank, Domm was pulled forward onto his face and dragged closer to Silver as the scorpion tails reared back to strike.

"On the other hand, maybe I can't keep myself away from you," Domm grumbled. He extended his other spider legs in front of himself, and used them to slingshot himself forward. The sudden lack of resistance caused Silver to lose his balance and pull Domm towards him with great speed, and Domm half-rolled in the air, preparing to drop-kick the general…

But Silver was ready yet again, grabbing Domm's feet and spinning him before tossing him away. Domm, at least, was untangled as he was thrown, landing hard on his right side. "Sorry, but you aren't as great as you think you are, friend," Silver stated calmly, as his tentacles grabbed Domm's ankles and pulled him into the air.

"I'm not finished with this Irken!" More tentacles, comprised of solid shadow, reached out and entangled Domm's arms, pulling him away from Silver. Niz appeared at the end of the tentacles, which were extending from his sleeve. "He is mine to pass judgment on!"

"What?" both Domm and Silver replied, almost in unison.

"I get to kill him!"

"Oh," Silver said. "I don't see any problem with that-" Silver didn't get any farther, as Domm decided he didn't enjoy the possibility of being drawn and quartered. He whipped one of his spider legs out under Niz's shadow tentacles, knocking the smaller Irken off his feet. The tentacles immediately dissipated, and Domm curled up to grab Silver's tentacles as he fell to the ground. Ignoring the impact, he blasted the tentacles briefly with his ability, and the wave of disrupting energy caused them to go limp. "Hey! What are you doing?" Silver yelled, striking forward with his 'scorpion tails'.

Domm, having just climbed to his feet, jumped away from the weapons and drew out Vex's rifle from his PAK. He let loose with a spray of bullets, and Silver had to run for cover as one glanced off his shoulder pad. "Erris, I'm surrounded here!" Domm shouted, knowing she'd hear from the live feed of the cameras recording the fight. Niz was on his feet again, and Domm drew his shotgun in his other hand, charging the Necro-Irken even as he formed his Shadow Tentacles.

_"Keep the fight at your current location. I've got a plan."_ Domm dodged Niz's first summoned tentacle with a jump and levied the guns at him, blasting Niz with a hail of mixed plasma and ballistic fire. Niz snarled in pain as pieces of flesh fell away from him, but some mystical force quickly repaired any serious structural damage to his body, and he remained on his feet through the attack. Waving his claw, he managed to call a tentacle from Domm's own shadow to spring up and catch him out of the air. Domm was slammed back-first to the ground, then whipped around until he lost his grip on both weapons. Finally, Niz allowed the tentacle to toss Domm through the air and dismissed it, chasing after Domm.

"You cost me a soul down in the sewer, mercenary!" Niz yelled. "Yours will take its place!" Domm got up on his elbows and knees, vomiting a bit from the disorientation. His head was spinning; _Whatever Erris is planning, she'd better make it fast._ He climbed halfway to his feet before Niz punched him back to the ground, summoning his Shadow Scythe as he placed a foot on Domm's chest. "This will be quick and painless… but it will be messy."

"My turn!" Silver yelled, brandishing Domm's (stolen) rifle. With the accuracy of a true marksman, he put several rounds into Niz's head even as he turned around, causing the Irken to topple over. "And now I'll finish you, _Freelance_ Mercenary Domm!" There was mocking sarcasm in the word 'freelance.'

"You're out of ammo," Domm said calmly as he decided on the fastest route to his shotgun. "I've counted the rounds."

"You're bluffing, kid, and it shows no matter how hard you – SON OF A BITCH! I am out of ammo." Too late – Domm was heading for the shotgun. Silver raced him, his longer legs quickly gaining on Domm. It was neck and neck… and then spikes of shadow burst out from below the gun, and Domm and Silver alike reeled back to avoid being stabbed.

"Shadows, bring it to me!" The Enigma shotgun disappeared, sinking into the darkness pooling around it, and reappeared in Niz's shadow, where he eagerly scooped it up. "What have we here? A plasma shotgun? Well, it won't work on me, but I'd imagine it'll make short work of you two." He levied it at Domm and Silver; he wasn't as steady with the firearm as they were, but a shotgun hardly requires pinpoint accuracy. "If either of you two are willing to surrender now, I'll teleport you offworld and be done with it."

"Give me back my gun or I will show you some good old-fashioned pain," Domm answered.

"Go fuck yourself," Silver growled.

"I gave you the chance," Niz sighed as he aimed the gun at Silver. Silver's PAK quickly unfolded four short appendages which formed a bubble shield around him, but just one direct blast from the shotgun was enough to disperse the shield and stagger Silver back. Silver quickly dove behind an overturned dumpster. Niz, ignoring a faint roaring in the background, searched for Domm, only to find him ducking behind a crashed rocket.

Domm quietly pulled his chainsaw from his PAK and readied it, realizing that the rocket was in fact the tub of nachos that Ethys had poisoned not long ago. _I can't believe I've gone in a complete circle!_ Domm was in pretty poor shape, worse than he had thought; starting a new battle after the extended one with Ethys may have been a bad idea. He was feeling a bit weary (most races would have been completely exhausted, but then again most races don't use PAKs), and he had actually lost a decent amount of blood fighting Ethys and the others. Niz and Silver hadn't seriously hurt him yet, but he had been tossed around like a ragdoll by both of them, which was unpleasant to say the least. _That roaring's getting loud… it sounds familiar, too…_

"I've found you, mercenary!" Niz cried, brandishing Domm's shotgun as he stood atop the vat. Domm jumped forward and slashed at him with the chainsaw, and although Niz dodged the attack, he lost his footing and fell on his back as Domm landed on the vat. "Shadow Cocoon!" Niz said breathlessly upon landing, and Domm's shadow stretched upwards in a cylindrical shape to envelop him and hold him still. "Now, enjoy your head exploding!" Niz yelled, bringing up his weapon.

It was at that point that a large multipurpose construction vehicle crashed into Niz and caught him in a large pincer-like mechanism, trapping and stunning him. The shotgun went flying, but Domm had other things on his mind. "YES!" Domm yelled as his vehicle wheeled to a stop, dropping its undead cargo. "How'd you do that, Erris?!"

_"Well, Lio was just __**kind**__ enough to tell me that that motorcycle can be remote-controlled."_

"_It didn't seem relevant at the time, get off my back!"_

"_SHUT UP, MAN!"_

"_Don't you tell me to shut up!"_

"_I'll tell you whatever I fucking…"_ Domm cut off contact for the moment, jumping into the driver's seat, sliding his chainsaw neatly into his PAK, and disengaging the remote pilot function. A burst of plasma narrowly missed him, and Domm slammed on the accelerator as he noticed Silver aiming the shotgun at him.

"You two can settle this amongst yourself," Domm yelled over the roar of the engine, "and I'll play with the winner!"

"Like hell I'm letting you get away! I am GENERAL TAKAHIRO, and I never lose!" Domm was forced to turn the speeding cycle towards Silver as the taller Irken fired the shotgun again, using the machine's thicker shielding in front to protect himself. Giving it more gas, Domm was soon trying to run Silver down. Cursing, Silver deployed his spider legs and scuttled back and away from the vehicle, dropping the shotgun when a mechanical leg became briefly stuck in a pothole. The Enigma only bounced once before it was caught under the steamroller-like front wheel of Domm's vehicle and flattened in a small blue fireball.

"You made me crush my weapon! **I'm gonna murder you, you bastard!**" The destruction of his weapon only made Domm chase Silver with more fervor. Silver saw an opening and leapt into the air, retracting his spider-legs in favor of a scorpion tail to finish Domm off, but Domm extended a pair of his own spider legs on his left side. One magnetized to Silver's shoulder pad and another pierced the Irken general's thigh, and Domm's momentum pulled Silver completely off-track and took him along for the ride.

"What the hell are you doing?!" Silver yelled, his composure completely gone as he struggled not to hyperventilate, hanging in the air at high speeds.

Domm lowered Silver to ground level and the general's other shoulder guard kicked up a huge trail of sparks as it slid along the ground. "Bringing you to a sudden stop!" Domm prepared to pass the nacho vat on his left, slamming Silver into it at ninety kilos per hour.

"HOLY CRAP NO!" Silver retracted the scorpion tail trailing behind him, and instead deployed a jet feature from his PAK, breaking loose from Domm and sailing over the nacho vat in the nick of time. Unfortunately, this left him spiraling off with a trail of clean-burning flame, trying desperately to gain air control.

Domm briefly brought the construction cycle to a stop, attempting to get his heart rate under control. "I'm at my limit," he wheezed as he retracted his spider-legs. "I need to get out of here and regroup."

Unfortunately, Niz was stumbling back to his feet. "I'm going to kill you yet, Domm," he insisted wearily before clutching the side of his head. "No, no, not yet…" Domm noticed a swirling blackness, similar to that of Niz's powers, was creeping across his right eye for a moment. Then it was gone, but Domm had already taken the chance to kick his cycle into gear and retreat.

"Get back here!" Niz roared, shooting another Shadow Tentacle from his sleeve. Like Domm, Niz was at his limit after this fight and his previous battle with the otherworldly abomination that called itself Dire, but he would be damned if he let this unrepentant murderer get away (Niz was, of course, damned already on several levels, but that's beside the point).

Domm suddenly felt another shadow tentacle wrap around him and attempt to pull him off the speeding vehicle, but he was fed up, and decided he simply wouldn't allow anything of the sort. Instead, he deployed four of his spider legs and wrapped them all around the front of his vehicle, holding on for dear life, and the lighter Niz found his tactic backfiring as he was yanked into the air like a midget during a rodeo. Niz also held on for dear life, but as his chest and chin hit the concrete and began to drag, this became a very questionable decision.

---

Silver raised his head, groaning. He'd been able to decelerate to something approaching a safe speed when a spotlight, its lights all smashed in, had gotten in his way and brought him to a complete stop. He was seeing quadruple, and his skeleton felt neither upright nor locked. But he was damned if he would let a freelancer and a fucking corpse make a fool of him.

Domm chose that moment to rush right under him on the cycle, with Niz very literally in tow. Silver's eyes narrowed as he watched him roar off.

_You're not the only one who found some transportation, Domm, and if that's the fastest that piece of scrap can go, you're in trouble._

---

_"Erris, I've got an unwanted passenger here." _Domm's voice, popping with static, came in on the radio. _"Your thoughts?"_

Erris, having cooled off from her argument with Lio, took the controls. "Hang on, I had found something that might be handy. See, there's a nuclear power plant five kilometers north of your position. Completely automated. Still powering the city! Anyway, I bet you can find a nice deathtrap there to get rid of that pesky Niz, and then you can focus on Silver."

_"Silver broke my WEAPON, Erris! I'm going to make him suffer!"_

"We all saw the live feed, Domm," Erris deadpanned. "You're the one who crushed it under a motorbike. Besides, we have, like, two more just like it back at the base."

_"Nevertheless, there will be blood for this!"_

"Yeah, whatever, just make tracks for the nuclear plant."

"Hey, this is cool," Lio said, attracting Erris and Edh's attention. "A lot of ships are making landings on planets, picking up the dead. That's against tournament rules; I wonder why the Armada hasn't shot them down?"

"Probably some sympathetic Irkens high on the chain of command, there," Erris guessed. "It's a big mistake on their part; Irken bodies can be easily revived from a near-death state, and even if the body's entirely destroyed, some intact software in the PAK could mean easy resurrection." She shook her head, smiling. "Shoddy security work."

"They're probably letting it happen because it makes good TV," Edh added. "Ooh, I had no idea Tika's handler was such a looker! I bet he's even more _ravishing_ without the visor."

---

"You can let go any time, you know!" Domm yelled over the roar of the motorcycle. As much fun as it was to roadhaul his opponent for several thousand meters, the fact that Niz was holding on via a shadow tentacle around Domm's waist was murder on the mercenary's lower back… besides, as soon as Niz let go, Domm could just run over the necromancer's skull and see if that wouldn't kill him.

Actually, Domm had been going a solid 60 kph for over two minutes now, heading towards the nuclear plant. That Niz was still holding on, when his body had been worn down to stained bone on his elbows, knees, chest and chin, spoke of his boundless determination as well as his ability to shrug off wounds that even a strong Irken warrior would never recover from. "I mean seriously, you must be getting little bits of the road inside your ribcage, man!" Domm called out, hoping to encourage him into letting go.

"Drop the line?!" Niz yelled as if Domm had suggested Niz do very rude things to his own mother. "When I've come so far already?! No, I let go when we come to a stop!"

"I admire your determination, my supernatural and most worthy opponent, but the dark hero act is getting tiresome! I bet a lot of people would pay dearly to see you dead…" If Domm hadn't turned to see if he could jar Niz loose with a sharp turn, he wouldn't have seen Silver approaching fast on a much smaller motorcycle – and unlike Domm's vehicle, Silver's had clearly been designed for the simple point of being a motorcycle. It was a light machine, similar in color to its rider's eyes, and it was easily doing 100 kph. Domm didn't doubt it could run at twice that; as it was, Silver pulled up alongside Domm and matched speeds almost as easily as if Domm was standing still.

"Pleasant day for a ride, isn't it?!" Silver laughed maniacally to punctuate the rhetorical question. He turned to Niz. "Aww, Domm, you're ruining his face doing that!"

"He can let go any time he wants to!" Domm replied warily, keeping one eye on the road while the other was trained on Silver.

"Mmm, I see… well, I didn't want to let you two run off and have all the fun, so I brought some fireworks!" Silver's PAK slid open with a hiss, and out came the largest gun Domm had ever seen concealed in a customized PAK. At the end of an incredibly thick, single-jointed limb was a metallic canister nearly large enough to store Niz's entire body, open at one end. An extra, thinner limb extended from the top of the PAK simply to stabilize the unwieldy chassis. From the glowing blue interior of the canister, a sizable spike extended from a smaller, glowing cylindrical power core. Two other clawlike appendages stuck out diagonally from the power core, poking at and containing a growing ball of hot plasma balanced on the spike's tip. Fins extended from the top and bottom of the apparatus, and a sideways Irken Empire symbol proudly decorated each side.

"Holy shit!" Domm replied eloquently. If he was correct in his estimate, that entire plasma reaction would be launched at his motorcycle as soon as it finished charging, or more likely ahead of him. Domm had experienced plasma reactions with his own shotgun, but the Enigma used a smaller ball of plasma and kept it more stable, only spraying out small bits at once. Even small bits of that plasma ball contained all the power of a semi-automatic shotgun; Domm wasn't entirely sure what the whole shebang at the end of Silver's cannon would do, but he hated all of the likely possibilities. Although Dire, Niz, and Zor had all had access to such raw power in this tournament, Dire was inexperienced and unable to use the power to its full potential, while Zor was reluctant to use it in a lethal capacity. Niz was much the same way, Domm realized; although he often knowingly attacked with lethal force, the Necro-Irken didn't entirely want to kill, and couldn't really put all of his willpower behind it.

Silver, as Domm had predicted, fired the plasma blast ahead of Domm's vehicle instead of straight towards it. Swallowing hard, Domm turned to his right and slammed the gas pedal down as far as it would go; there was a green blast that quickly turned into a horrible glowing vacuum and then Domm was PAST IT yes he had driven past it and the danger was averted! It didn't matter that Silver was still on his trail, or that Niz's Shadow Tentacle would leave another bruise across his torso from the sudden acceleration, he was out of immediate danger.

Takahiro, meanwhile, had successfully slowed to avoid Domm suddenly barreling into his lane, but hadn't counted on Niz swinging in like a kite's tail and smacking into his side. _Of course, _Domm noted as Silver fell behind and retracted the ludicrous cannon to narrowly avoid spinning out. _While that cannon's out, Silver can't dodge for crap. _Maintaining his increased speed (almost twice what he had been going), Domm sped off towards the nuclear power plant, its cooling towers now looming on the daybreak horizon.

Silver caught his breath before gunning it again, squinting as he took his rice rocket to ridiculous velocity. "So he's heading for the plant… good choice, Domm." Silver chuckled darkly as he drifted into a turn, cruising instead down a parallel street.

**Transmission Interrupted**

**Warning: Long-ass fight scene is only half over.**

**The sector message for where Silver can locate Domm and Niz is a double-reference to _Mostly Harmless_, the last of Douglas Adams' _Hitchhiker's Guide_ books.**

Domm sure has an irrational attachment to his weapons, doesn't he? This comes up again in Part 2.

And yes, there is a kind of short vehicle battle (hardly a battle by the standards I set for myself). I wanted one between Domm and Silver, but mostly I wanted to roadhaul Niz and to have Domm's vehicle blown up this round.


	10. Round 5 Part II: Vs Niz and Silver

**I'm so horrible. I said I'd have this up tomorrow... two weeks ago. Ugh.**

**Anyway, turns out I didn't win, but I made it to the finals, and I'll do my duty of showing you guys everything I had. There's also a second Blood-Sport planned - same account, new management, entries accepted through the end of November (ALL complete entries accepted), tournament begins New Year's Day 2010. Characters from all IZ races will be in this one, not just Irkens. I myself am entering an elderly Vortian swordmaster.**

**Disclaimer: Irkens and Invader Zim belong to Jhonen Vasquez and Nickelodeon. Blood-Sport belongs to its management. Silver belongs to The Darkest Prince. Niz belongs to Irken-Maniac. All else is (c) me.  
**

**Blood-Sport Round 5:**

**Between Black and Silver**

**Transmission Reacquired**

Domm pulled the vehicle into the sharpest turn he had managed, steering around a toppled building that had been cleaved by an orbital laser during the Irken conquest. Niz was thrown ribs-first into a sideways ledge and cried out in pain, but still kept his grip on Domm. Domm slowed as he turned back towards the power plant; it appeared to him that he'd lost Silver en route, and he was almost there.

Driving through the city, Domm was amazed at the state of the ruined planet – there wasn't even a single corpse of the native species in either the industrial or city zones, and the architectural damage seemed shockingly low considering the Irken Empire's usual lack of subtlety. He'd had Erris do a background check on the planet, but the results had been unbelievable at the time – after a short and less-than-promising attempt at a land war, the Irkens had withdrawn to use the planet for field testing of military weapons. What finished the race off was a prototype bacterium – one that fed primarily on water. The idea had been for the viruses to devour the water-based creatures and then die off when there was no more liquid water, and the virus had been a partial success. It hadn't affected the glaciers, the atmosphere or the salty oceans, and thus didn't have the terraforming effects the scientists had hoped for, but it had killed off most of the population before they had found the virus couldn't reach them in the heart of the arid wasteland. So it was that the Armada's land units had landed in the wasteland and slaughtered the remaining 4% of the population (not without casualties, as it was mostly soldiers and survivalists remaining), marking the only major battlefield as well as the only location with older corpses.

"Well, Niz, looks like we're here," Domm called out. Niz replied with a sort of moaning growl and Domm turned to see if the necromancer's lower jaw was still attached or if it had been ground away at some point. That's when he saw the plasma beam, and although he slammed on the brakes, it was too late to do much about it.

The aqua-colored beam struck the front wheel of Domm's construction cycle, and everything pretty much went to hell. In the split second before the blast radius expanded to encompass the entire vehicle, it flipped forward and Domm and Niz were both thrown over the colorful implosion. At this range, the high-yield plasma blast was a total sensory overload to Domm – the smell of ozone, a deep roaring, and a bright blue flash threatening to supercede all else. He was only dimly aware of Niz tumbling and rolling as he was dragged into the blue dome, bits of asphalt flying past him as they were also drawn in, and hugging the ground with the strength he could gather so that the same didn't happen to him. The next thing Domm managed to gather was that he was on fire – or at least his vest was, wreathed in crackling flames. Whatever else the clothes on this planet were, they were flammable; Domm scrambled on the ground, peeling the burning bits of clothing away from him and singing his hands a bit. When the hellish roaring was replaced by the ringing of his aural cavities, Domm looked up and beheld teal flames engulfing the twisted remains of his vehicle and a still, unmoving, but relatively whole Niz. Domm struggled to his hands and knees, dry-retched a few times, and finally got to his feet, grabbing his chainsaw and whipping his head around blearily.

He didn't have to look far. Silver walked away from his motorcycle, having put the kickstand down, and retracted his plasma cannon. "I'm a pretty good shot, aren't I?" he asked merrily. "But seriously, you're overdue for a nasty end."

"Shit," Domm muttered as Silver extended his four tentacles, two tipped with scorpion tails, all lashing. He reached into his PAK and threw a steam grenade towards Silver, running towards the plant as Silver jumped back cautiously. The entrance to the large, sprawling complex was less than fifty meters from him; by the time Silver had found out the steam was harmless and made his way through it, Domm was through the fence (no real task, considering the gate was torn from its hinges) and inside. Cursing, Silver followed, his longer strides covering ground quicker than the mercenary's.

Neither noticed when a burned Irken corpse got up and silently followed them through the fence's gate and the revolving doors.

---

"So why are you a mercenary, anyway?" Silver asked as he walked calmly after the running Domm. His tentacles lashed out, but Domm ducked and weaved, dodging one crashing metal tendril after another. Steel panels covering the walls were heavily dented or even torn apart, but Domm was like Silver – trained to be a fighter since smeethood, and with no shortage of raw talent. Even weakened, pushed to the edge of his adrenaline rush, striking him was no easy task.

"Not that it's any of your business…" Domm gasped, leaping over a low-swinging tentacle and swinging his chainsaw to 'scare off' another impending one, "but the Irken Empire decided at some point to kill off all the cases in the program that trained me. You would have left, too."

"But those orders have long since been dropped!" Silver tried to surround Domm with his tendrils, careful not to let him sever them, but to no avail as Domm ducked through a set of sliding double doors. "You can come back any time!" He tried to get through the doors, but Domm had disabled them from the other side.

"I owe nothing to the Empire that attempted to have me executed! Miyuki's orders would have seen me put down! And everybody thinks of her as the GREATEST Tallest of our era!" Silver slammed his two scorpion tails into the door's seam and pried it open, only for Domm to leap out from his hiding place in a corner and sever one of the two sharp-tipped appendages. Instantly he was beset by the other three tentacles, forcing him back and away from the relatively vulnerable Silver.

"That regime isn't even in power anymore! What about your duties to the Irken race?!" Silver countered, his temper rising as he allowed himself to be drawn into the argument. He went for a pincer attack, only for Domm to extend his bladed spider legs and parry two of the tentacles while he severed the last one.

"Don't give me that old-fashioned concept! You really think just because I'm born into a species, I owe that species for my whole life?" Domm swung the saw again, but Silver's tentacles retracted, even the two undamaged ones on his left side. Instead, Silver produced two weapons that made Domm's blood run cold.

"Yes! Yes, I think that's perfectly reasonable!" In his left hand, Silver held an old-fashioned steel katana, gleaming under the fluorescent lights of the nuclear plant's hallways. It was dirty, but seemed exceptionally well-made, with great attention to detail. In his right, he held a beam sword, its blade roughly the same length as the katana. The handle drew power from his PAK, which was connected to it by a cord, and the energy it produced lit up the whole room. It was this sword that Domm was afraid of, because beam swords were the 'rock' to his chainsaw's 'scissors'. "Like it or not, Domm, you are an IRKEN, and you have to contribute to the species if you don't want us to go extinct!"

"Shove it up your ass!" Domm shot out the spider legs on his right side and punched them into a nearby ventilation shaft, pulling the grate out. "I don't give a damn about the Irken species! I only care about myself and a few close friends!" He tossed the grate at Silver; the Irken general cut right through it, but it gave Domm a moment to crawl into the grate. "The universe is a harsh place, and you need to learn not to care about people you've never met!"

"I'm not finished with you yet!" Silver snarled, running after Domm, but he was simply too large for the shaft. Luckily, it ran along the outside of the wall for a few moments before turning 90 degrees and leaving the hallway, so Silver began hacking at the shaft with his blades. Domm had to scramble for his life, dodging the alternating steel and laser blades that cut at the floor of the shaft. Suddenly, the solid katana burst up through the shaft, and it struck flesh.

Silver drew back his katana and inspected the blood dripping from it. "Hmm… there's no way I finished him off. Only the sharp side has blood on it; I didn't impale him." He reared back, and cleaved clean through the shaft with his beam sword, but by now Domm was in the vents above a completely different hallway, stopping to wipe at the slash Silver had left between his antennae before he got blood on the lenses of his goggles.

"Alright, I'll just have to kill the lights and sneak up on him. Shouldn't be too hard." Domm kicked out the nearest grate and landed on his feet, but barely kept his footing. "Then again…" Getting to his feet with a cough, Domm noticed a footstep and turned. "I shouldn't be surprised, I suppose."

"You…" Niz rasped. His cloak, along with most of his other clothes, were pockmarked with spots that had simply burned away in the plasma, and unfortunately, so was his skin. One eye had partially clouded over black, and most of the flesh around it was missing. "I refuse to lose to the likes of you. I have died too many times already. I will not die today…" he shuddered, then ran at Domm. "I'm so weak, dammit, but I WILL NOT DIE TODAY!" With a snarl, claws extended like an animal's, he rushed straight at Domm.

"Thank you for being so predictable," Domm sighed, and drew his chainsaw, stabbing it clean through Niz's abdomen with the teeth pointing upward. Niz gasped and stopped, and Domm revved the Grimm's motor, creating a spray of congealed blood out of Niz's back that splattered across the entire hallway. "So, how about you tell me how I finish you?"

"Go to _hell!_" Niz's arms flailed for purchase, something, anything… he grabbed Domm's already wounded scalp with one claw and slashed at it. Yelping, Domm slapped out at Niz with his free hand, knocking the black mask off his forehead and exposing similar wounds… scars spelling out 'X-I-X' on the Necro-Irken's skull for all to see. "My shame is not for you to behold!" Niz caught Domm's slapping wrist and started to twist it; Domm responded by pulling the chainsaw up through Niz's torso. As soon as the grinding became more metallic, Niz's eyes widened and he dedicated both arms to pushing Domm's saw back down.

"You have a terrible poker face, Niz. I see… that unique PAK of yours is what keeps you getting up from all these mortal wounds. If I were to, say, split it in half, you'd flop over dead like you're so overdue for."

"You wouldn't! You'd upset the very balance of life and death-"

"I don't really want to hear it!" Domm attempted to pull his Grimm Special up and bisect the necromancer, but Niz held fast to the blade's handle, his feet leaving the ground in an effort to keep Domm from cutting through. Roaring in sync with his saw, Domm lifted Niz, using his blade as a grip, and swung him against the wall. A few bashes against the wall later, Domm was panting, but Niz wasn't letting go. "Dammit!" Domm suddenly pulled back with his saw, slicing at what was left of Niz's claws as he pulled free of the smaller Irken. Niz gasped as the fresh wave of pain slowed him, and Domm drew back his saw to behead his foe. "This ends now."

"I couldn't agree more." A metal tentacle suddenly wrapped around Niz and lifted him up, using him as a bludgeon to knock Domm off his feet and into a large scarlet case marked **'IN CASE OF EMERGENCY, BREAK GLASS' **(which Domm did, but not willfully). As Silver walked fully into view, another tentacle, tipped with a scorpion tail, extended from his PAK. Niz tried to squirm free, the hooked weapon punched several holes in his chest and one more through his eye. Niz screamed in pain, and Silver responded by throwing him through a safety glass door into the next room. "That was rather therapeutic," Silver chuckled, turning on Domm.

It was then that he noticed something rather large and heavy had fallen from the emergency case into Domm's lap. If Domm didn't have a minor concussion, he would probably have paid more attention to it himself. "What have we here?" Silver's words woke Domm up and he made a grab for the device, but Silver pulled it away and smiled a very nasty smile. "It's a fuel rod gun. Rather appropriate for defending a nuclear fission plant." He turned the safety off, and the weapon unfolded into rather impressive proportions, becoming an oblong weapon designed to be wielded two-handed, supported on one shoulder like an RPG launcher. Silver did so, and the end of the gun flipped open to reveal four barrels. A scope unfolded in front of his right eye. "I like it."

Domm jumped out of the way with a scream, which proved to be a prudent decision when a ten-inch-long, inch-wide, glowing green rod punched into the sheet metal where his head had been. Silver whipped the gun around, but at this distance it was rather hard to aim and Domm was able to dodge the next three fuel rods as well – although two of them finished destroying the glass that Silver had tossed Niz through. Noticing the new exit, Domm swung out a spider leg to bash the fuel rod gun out of Silver's arms. The Irken general hung on, but he was thrown off-balance and Domm had time to jump backwards into the next room. He wasn't prepared for what it contained.

Domm had been expecting another hallway – but this room was huge and cylindrical, a shaft thirty feet wide and ten stories deep. The upper half of the room was dotted with catwalks, steel ladders and stairways connecting the catwalks, and control panels (also on the catwalks); he had emerged onto one of the highest levels. The bottom of the room was full of tanks protected by lead shielding; judging by the large mechanical claw that hung in the air above them, Domm guessed that it was a room for sealing off the high-yield waste in the power plant. The catwalk Domm stood on stretched across the void, as well as connecting to the perpendicular catwalks above and below with stairways. Niz was trying desperately to stand up several yards in front of him, and not making much headway. "Wow," Domm said; he was too tired for wit.

Then he heard the sound of something sliding into position as Silver prepared to fire his weapon again, and he decided to get the hell out of the way. Four more fuel rods blasted out, one of them grazing Niz and another punching deep into the necromancer's damaged eye, but Domm managed to dodge by swinging up onto the highest catwalk with his spider legs. Running out onto the catwalk as he reloaded, Silver let loose another fuel rod; Domm tried to use his high ground as cover, but was in for an unpleasant shock when the fuel rod tore easily through the steel mesh platform he crouched on. Running down the walkway, he managed to avoid two more clips of four fuel rods each.

"You can't just keep using that thing, Silver! It's going to run out of rods soon!" Domm reached a control panel and gave it a cursory glance before pounding his fist on the biggest, reddest button he saw. A dull klaxon filled the air as the lead shields at the bottom of the room slid open; a message from Domm's PAK told him that the radiation levels were dangerously high, but that the PAK could prevent any radiation poisoning if he left within twenty minutes. _No matter… I plan to put a stop to this here and now._

"You're right… I'd better make these next shots count!" Silver's PAK tentacles extended again, but instead of reaching towards Domm, they shot out to either side of the exhausted mercenary. Domm prepared for a pincer attack again, but the tendrils wrapped around the catwalk and began to pull as Silver braced his ankles against the railing of the platform he himself stood on. "I'd like to see you dodge while in freefall!" And he could probably do it, Domm fretted; already, the catwalk was beginning to groan in a few key places.

"Oh well… I had no way of attacking you from up here anyway!" Taking a few steps back, Domm then ran forward and vaulted off the control panel, leaping into the air with his chainsaw at the ready. Surprised, Silver launched a fuel rod at him and pulled his tentacles back in, but missed with both. His second shot would have hit Domm point-blank, but the mercenary had seemingly fallen short of his goal, dropping down in front of Silver. Silver, for his part, didn't believe Domm had fallen for a second, and he dropped the huge gun immediately to retrieve his two swords. When Domm swung up and over the other side of the catwalk Silver stood on, the taller Irken turned on his heel and blocked the Grimm with his laser blade. There was nothing Domm could do but gulp and push back at the growing roar as the chainsaw sword attempted to tear through concentrated, contained energy. Finally, with a shriek, the bladed chain broke at one link or another and rocketed into the air, embedding itself into the distant ceiling. "My… **chainsaw!"** Domm moaned, jumping backwards to a lower platform to dodge Silver's follow-up with his other blade.

"How did it stick up in the roof like that?" Silver asked, hefting his fuel rod gun again.

"The chain rotates at 0.997 times the speed of sound," Domm explained lovingly. "That's where the cutting power comes from. It was a fantastic weapon, and it's saved my life so many times over, and you… YOU RUINED IT!" He was on the edge of tears as all six of his spider legs unfolded, lifting him ten feet into the air so he was at Silver's height again. "You'll suffer for that!"

"No, you'll suffer for the trouble you've caused me!" Silver took aim with his massive new gun.

**"You'll both suffer for all eternity!"** The two turned to Niz, who wasn't looking quite… himself. His intact eye had darkened to a deep, true black that reflected no light, and his missing eye was leaking an evil-looking smoke into the air. Shadows swirled around him, and he was clutching at his chest with both hands, looking ready to burst out laughing… or screaming.

"Huh. You know, if being a necromancer makes you that hard to kill, I should look into it," Domm said.

"Oh, definitely," Silver agreed. "Niz… OPEN WIDE, BITCH!" He fired several more fuel rods at the Necro-Irken, but Niz shot into the air like a rocket, dodging them with ease.

**"Shadow Scythe Tentacles!"** Niz screamed in an eerily echoing voice, and multiple Shadow Tentacles formed from his cloak, each tipped with a scythe blade. Seeming to slow in midair, he waved a skeletal claw (since being burned by the plasma, there was no flesh on his hands to disappear or reappear) and the blades came rocketing down at both of them. Domm retracted his spider legs, dodging the first attacks by simply falling out of the way, but Silver was forced to drop his fuel rod gun and run. When the tentacles blocked his way, he hacked at them with his swords, and parried the strikes coming from all directions as best he could. Still, the inky black weapons began to leave small cuts in his skin and armor where his guard began to slip. Domm was even worse off, forced to rely on his spider leg blades to block the tendrils.

Niz landed on the ground near Silver. The Irken general tried to slash at his foe, but Niz was much faster now, and attacks with blades of metal and light alike were easily evaded. After a few such dodges, Niz drew back his shadows and formed a more traditional scythe in his claws, forcing Silver back with lightning-quick swings. Silver eventually made a jetPAK-assisted jump to the higher catwalk to catch his breath. "Come and get me, you little bitch!" he shouted over the power plant's alarms. "It's about time we put you down for good!"

**"We will NEVER be silenced!"** Niz snarled back. The shadow scythe in his hands extended as he held it straight up, becoming disproportionately larger the further it got from his body. Soon he was holding a massive shadow above his head, with a blade larger than Silver's body.** "Taste our true power!"** He swung the scythe down, forcing Silver to dive out of the way as the blade cut straight through the platform. Silver began a mad scramble to get to the next section of the platform as the length he stood on began to collapse, falling until it hung vertically from the wall.

Laughing, Niz raised the tremendous scythe for another strike, but had to suddenly dismiss it as he turned to block Domm's punch. "That was pretty quick, right there," Domm said, making a grab for Niz's PAK. Niz dodged back and opened his mouth wide, and a shadow tentacle launched out and struck Domm's chest, knocking him on his back. Swallowing the tentacle, Niz concentrated the darkness into his hands, using his umbrakinesis to create a huge blade at the end of each finger. "What the hell is this now?" Domm muttered, rolling back to his feet. At the far end of the platform, Silver jumped down, making a dash for either his fuel rod gun or Niz's back – Domm couldn't tell from this angle.

**"Shadow Scythe Claws!"** Niz looked very pleased with himself (themselves?) as he advanced on Domm, the massive catlike claws posed in front of him to strike. Domm lashed out with his own scythes, but Niz deflected them with ease and stabbed forward with his other hand. Domm hit the deck and slashed at Niz's ankles, forcing Niz into the air. A volley of fuel rods flew at Niz as well, forcing Domm to stay on the ground, but the crazed necromancer blocked them easily with his new claws. Niz perched briefly on the handrail, seemed to store up energy for a moment, and finally launched himself towards Silver with a roar.

Silver decided to abandon the platform when he saw a whirling dervish of six black blades coming at him, and jumped to a lower level. It was a good thing, too, because Niz's whirling blades minced the catwalk, sending himself and Domm falling to the next level down as well. Domm used his spider-legs to absorb the shock, while Niz just flipped to land on his feet, re-absorbing his claws. "I've had ENOUGH of you!" Silver blasted several more fuel rods at Niz. They embedded themselves in his chest, but he didn't even stagger.

**"Now, we will bring hell to **_**you**_**. SHADOW GATE!" **Niz raised his arms as if celebrating, and the cloud of shadow leaking from his eye began to coalesce into a more solid darkness behind him. Soon the shadows behind him had become an ebon void several feet in diameter, and new shadow tentacles formed along the edges, writhing and snaking through the air. **"Lash out! Devour them!"** At Niz's command, the tentacles began striking somewhat blindly in Silver and Domm's general direction, grabbing onto whatever they could and dragging it into the Gate. Domm dodged out of the way, and a piece of handrail was torn loose instead; Silver jumped back, but his fuel rod gun was grabbed and torn from his hands, forcing him to fall back on his swords again. Any piece of metal, including dangling parts of the collapsed walkways above, that was grabbed would be fed into Niz's Shadow Gate. They couldn't see what happened to the stuff, but the roar of metal fatiguing was very suggestive.

"Alright, mercenary, I'm not too keen on being eaten by whatever Niz is turning into!" Silver snapped as he slashed away several tentacles. The cut shadows fell into scraps that then were sucked back into Niz, reforming the tentacles. Domm noticed idly as he jumped to the lowest level catwalk that nothing in the room was casting shadows anymore; Niz had absorbed them all. He had no time to wonder exactly how powerful the physics-warping Irken was as he slashed at the shadows around him; Zor had been powerful too, but he was dead now. "Any bright ideas?" Silver was backed up against the wall now, trying desperately not to let the tendrils disarm him or wrap around his forearms.

"Just one." Domm reached back into his PAK and found exactly what he was looking for – Ethys' last flash grenade. Suddenly, he stopped moving, and offered it out to one of the tentacles as if he were offering a sugar cube to a horse. The shadow tentacle eagerly grabbed the orb and pulled it into the Gate – and suddenly Niz's remaining eye opened in shock. "This will be cool." Domm turned away, slapping away one last tentacle.

The only sound was a windy rustling – it was as if a small cyclone had spawned around Niz. The Gate cracked and finally shattered as radiant white light poured out from its heart; the remaining scraps of shadow whirled around the necromancer at high speeds before returning to their original sources in the room. More light shined from Niz's empty eye socket and his mouth as he gasped for air, falling to his knees. The pieces of shadow fleeing him tore at his antennae and cloak, shredding both as they left him. **"It hurts… what did you do… to us?!"**

"Oh, come on, that's got to be one of the oldest ones in the book," Domm complained as he rubbed at his eyes. Even turned away with his eyes closed and goggles on, that had been bright.

"Thanks, you saved my ass," Silver said earnestly as he dropped down to Domm's level, clutching both swords white-knuckle. "But it's time I closed the deal!" He rushed at Domm, ready to make mincemeat of him, and for the first time in decades Domm wasn't sure what he had left to fight with.

But from the other side, Domm was being attacked as well. Having his powers torn from him didn't halt this dark-eyed, more murderous Niz's will to fight, and he vaulted off his own current position, hurtling towards Domm like a meteor. **"I will not let this be! I am INDESTRUCTIBLE!" **Domm did the first thing that occurred to him.

He dove off the catwalk.

Niz was unable to change his flight path, and Silver was too surprised by Niz's continued presence to chase Domm. They did the only thing that they could – they attacked each other instead. Silver's katana embedded itself in Niz's abdomen, sliding easily through the area that Domm's saw had ground into paste, and his light sword lopped off one of Niz's arms with ease. Niz, for his part, cut the power cord to Silver's sword with his ragged bone claws, and as light as he was, his momentum was still sufficient to knock Silver flat on his back and stun him.

Grunting as he pulled himself off the larger Irken, Niz gasped as he saw his severed arm slide between the bars of the handrail. "NO!" Still run through with a katana, he dove after it, only then realizing he'd have nowhere to land himself. In the two seconds after falling, Niz noticed Domm hanging from the catwalk by his spider legs, and reached out for him, managing to grab the surprised Irken by the wrist. "Oh, shit," Niz muttered as he looked down in time to watch his arm fall into a huge basin. Inside the basin was a cache of dangerously radioactive, energy-grade plutonium columns, the sort used to power the plant – and to top it all off, they were suspended in a very deep pool of water. He may as well have been hanging above lava.

"Get off of me," Domm said quietly. Niz looked up at him, and Domm was very surprised – first, because Niz's intact eye had mostly reverted to orange, and second, because Niz had an almost childlike expression of fear on his face. Domm had been so used to anger and resigned determination from this foe that he didn't think any other expression was possible.

"Domm…" Niz whispered dryly. "I need you to kill me."

"Fine. Just let go, and I'll shut you into that basin."

"No, no – you need to knock me loose! I… I can't kill myself." At Domm's inquisitive quirked eyebrow, Niz went on. "I'm… afraid." Suddenly he was angry again. "Do you think I would hang so tenaciously to life if I wasn't afraid to die?! Every time I suffer a wound, Death grabs my hand, and I pull free. I always say 'NO'. The truth, Domm, is that I've been dead before. Really, and truly dead. I don't remember any of it, and I am so fucking terrified," Niz stopped to stifle a sob, "so terrified that there might not BE anything on the other side of death. I'm afraid it truly is the End.

"But this is no way for me to live. You saw that… that other side of me. I had to fight it today longer than any other time before. It hasn't even fully receded this time." As if to emphasize, the blackness began to creep up Niz's eye again. "I... don't think I'll resurface if it takes over again, and I don't want to be responsible for that monster being on the loose with my body and my powers. Just do your job, Domm… finish me off. And promise me you'll repent for all those you kill."

Domm extended his scythe-legs. "I have nothing to repent for," he said, although he knew it was a lie. "Death is the natural end to life. I kill when my job calls for it, and that's that." The tips of his blades lashed downward and dug into the joint of Niz's shoulder, snipping muscle and ligament, separating the bones. Domm was too busy concentrating on Niz's expression and maintaining his own to notice the small, black spidery creature that crawled from Niz's PAK, up Domm's spider leg, and into his own open PAK. "Goodbye, Niz." And with that, the Necro-Irken dropped into the water, and he sank like a stone. His arm came loose and dropped in a second after.

Looking up, Domm searched around until he noticed a huge blue button on the wall, next to one of the doors leading into the shaft. 'EMERGENCY BASIN LOCK', it read. "Huh, how convenient." Domm fished one of Zor's old orbs out of his side pocket and pulled back his arm, throwing it like a baseball at the lock. It hit the wall about a foot to the side of the button. "Damn." He grabbed the other and threw it the same way, and this one struck above the button by about six inches before dropping to the floor far below. "FUCK!" Domm shouted. Then things got worse, when 180 pounds of Irken General landed on Domm's back. Domm screamed in agony as his PAK was nearly torn loose from his spine; Silver's boots dug into the back of his hips, and his hands pushed down on Domm's shoulders. Two of Domm's spider legs lost their purchase on the platform, retracting into his PAK; he managed to keep the last pair in place, though.

"Let's finish this, my friend!" Silver dug his claws under Domm's PAK, scraping at his shirt and skin. "Shit, yours is really secure, isn't it? Wait, you bonded your PAK to your spinal cord!? How do you perform routine maintenance?"

"Have somebody… that I can trust to do it for me!" Domm grunted. He tried to deploy his bladed spider legs again, but Silver forced the panels shut with one hand.

"That must be nice, being naïve like that." Silver extended the PAK tentacle that was still tipped with a scorpion tail. "Oh well. I'll just have to cut out part of your spine when I pull this PAK off. Same result, but a little messier. Or I could just punch through the base of your skull…"

It was at that moment that Domm came up with a truly insane plan. Of course, he had to try it. With a moan, he used his spider legs to pull himself up enough that the first section of each leg stuck out straight to his side before bending at a ninety degree angle; it looked rather like his PAK was a wide trapeze that he and Silver hung from. With that accomplished, Domm began to roll backwards in place, first slowly, then faster as he completed a rotation. Silver was forced to retract the tentacle and straddle his shorter foe, hanging on for dear life as Domm began to spin in place like a master's yo-yo.

"What the fuck are you doing?!" Silver screamed. Vertigo took over and he accidentally vomited; the vomit shot from his mouth like a fire hose, and suddenly he understood. He was also even more disgusted, but from the vomit, not Domm's gambit.

Domm began to feel lightheaded as he spun in place, but he held onto consciousness by laughing as madly and loudly as he could. Silver didn't even hear it, as the speed stole the air from Domm's lungs as soon as he opened his mouth. _I hope to Irk I don't accidentally unscrew my PAK legs or something. If this works it'll be a miracle._

It was a race to see who could hold onto consciousness longer – and Silver lost, although it may have been because he was farther from the center of the 'wheel'. He blacked out for only a split-second, but it was enough to loosen his grip, and he was launched by the centrifugal force. By pure luck, he was thrown straight up, passing by the closest catwalk, and he laughed in relief. "Joke's on you, Domm! I'll land safely, and finish you then!"

It was then that Domm moved to the last and most vicious stage of his ploy. He brought out his bladed spider legs, extending them straight above his head. Silver may have destroyed the chainsaw Domm brought with him, but at the speed Domm was spinning, he was nothing if not a giant circular saw – and Silver was right in the path of his blade. There was a shower of sparks and a quiet yelp, and Silver was thrown to the catwalk on his back. He did land safely; however, he had the more pressing issue of having both arms severed to deal with.

Slowly, Domm stopped spinning, and he hung in place for a moment just to shake the dizzy feeling. When he finally pulled himself back up, he noticed that the catwalk he had been hanging from was also sliced through, but the cables it hung from kept it in place rather cleanly. Panting, he gave Silver a quick once-over – the general had fallen into shock, and would almost certainly bleed to death on his own. Domm decided he didn't have the energy to finish him off, and instead grabbed the damaged beam sword lying on the same level's walkway. _Maybe Lio can help me rig this to one of my spare chainsaw batteries._ He trudged over to the exit that featured the big blue button, and looked down into the basin before yelping in surprise. Something skeletal was in the large basin, thrashing around at surface level, and shadows were extending out from it. _HOLY SHIT I didn't need to see that!_ Domm quickly slammed on the button, and the lead-lined lid of the basin slid shut, imprisoning what may or may not have still had Niz in there somewhere. Domm dry-wretched over the railing of the walkway a few times, expecting vomit, but none came; finally, he just turned and left. "Total… write-off," he growled.

---

_Ah, here it is._ Stooping, Domm picked up Niz's black mask. He had used it as a headband to cover up the scars that other contestant had left on him. Domm felt at the bandages he had recently applied to his scalp where Silver had nearly impaled his skull. He had used so many strips of medicated gauze that it was practically a bandanna, covering the entire top of his head except for gaps where his antennae poked through. Deciding against it, Domm placed the eye-mask around his neck instead.

"Erris?" Domm called into his communicator. "You there?" No answer. He turned to one of the camera drones following him – not just his own, but Niz's and Silver's, one following at a respectable difference while another floated next to him and the third hovered ahead and above. "You guys aren't getting a signal either, are you?" The screen where Domm could usually converse with a scummy Irken reporter was showing a blank blue. "I thought not. Must be all the lead in here." Domm shivered and continued forward – he didn't want to show how weak blood loss and fatigue had left him, but he felt like passing out in a puddle of his own saliva.

"Where the HELL do you think you're going?!" As Domm turned to respond to the voice, he felt a metal spike slamming into his ribs, just below his left arm. He cried out in pain, falling to his knees, and Silver's two remaining PAK tentacles quickly constricted around Domm's left arm, squeezing and pulling at it. Silver was soaked in his own blood, still seeping from his shoulders and from his mouth with every pained exhalation. His skin was as grey as a Vortian's in the flickering light, one eye was clenched shut, and his teeth were gritted. "Did you really think I'd let you get away with that?!"

"Give it up, Takahiro," Domm spat. "You're out of the running, and you know it. There's no chance you'll be champion-" the sentence was punctuated with a scream as he felt a bone snap in his forearm. The tendrils kept on crushing, and blood was soon dribbling from Domm's sleeve.

"I KNOW that! But I have my pride, and there's no way in hell I'd let a faithless, cutthroat, sell-sword, DEFECTIVE like you win!" Silver screamed hoarsely. "I don't even HAVE to kill you here! I'll just cripple you and let the PROPER champion finish the job!"

"If I had kept my faith in the Empire… I would have been killed…" Domm gasped, his hands crackling with his unique birthright.

"THEN YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED!" Silver roared.

Domm made no reply verbally. Instead, he grabbed one of the tendrils with his free hands, sending a wave of disrupting static up to Silver's PAK. The many-hued current reached Silver, who quickly descended into wordless screams as his PAK, overtaxed as it was keeping him alive and conscious, began to blow out system after system. Finally, Silver loosened his grip on Domm's arm and sank to the floor, lifeless and unresponsive.

"Shit, that was a close one…" Domm got up and stared at his trembling left arm, hanging loosely from his shoulder, blood dripping from his fingers, his sleeve shredded to reveal similarly torn flesh underneath. He turned away and made it nearly ten steps before collapsing himself. "That was too close," he muttered, passing out.

**End of Round 5  
**

**That explosion that destroys Domm's bike is a little improbable, the way Domm is flipped somewhat out of harm's way. I'm taking artistic license with that one.**

**Silver spends the majority of Part II dominating the fight, partially because he's a general who got to the semifinals and partially because Domm and Niz were both just in major fights, while Silver starts out rosy fresh. I tried to do justice to Silver mostly by having him beat Domm up, and to Niz mostly by having him survive outrageous punishment. Also, I gave both of them insanely complicated and over-the-top deaths (well, as you can see Silver's didn't actually finish him off, so I basically killed him twice). As I told ngrey, ****Irken-Maniac and I have been waiting to fight each other for a while, so I've had the idea to drop Niz into nuclear waste for the better part of a year now.**

**Then I decided to put a fuel rod gun in the nuclear power plant, because that's a good place to put fuel rod guns for emergency defense, amiright? So Silver grabs that and gets even more out of control. He's not very accurate with it, but a lot of time is spent running from it all the same.**

**I try to set up a conflict with each character Domm fights. Silver's conflict with Domm here is obvious - Silver disapproves of Domm being freelance. Niz's is a little more subtle, although not much (I'm not really one for subtlety). Niz's conflict with Domm is simply that he doesn't want to die.**

**I had that last scene planned from the beginning as well; I left it out of the rough draft on dA to give people who read that a little more to look forward to. Silver's conflict with Domm is finally resolved (kinda), and he manages to destroy one more thing of Domm's before the final match starts (he did an awful lot of that). Next, look forward to a flashback about the execution Domm and Erris were up for. Oh, and Domm's last two lines there were pretty much jacked from the Rank 2 fight in _No More Heroes_, because I'm a hack.**

**Read thedarkestprince's and Irken-Maniac's entries, too; those two rock very hard, and you get to see Domm get boiled alive/his hand taken off and face sliced in half vertically. I'm still not sure how I beat them both.  
**


End file.
